LONG report on Radisson Seven Seas Voyager.. Aug19 Baltic sailing

Baltic itinerary, Stockholm, Sweden, to Rouen, France.

For those who want to see my quick synopsis of this cruise, without having
to read the "novella"..

This is not a drop dead gorgeous ship. There is no jaw dropping moment when
you see her exterior, or interior, for the first time. But she is tastefully
decorated, and we felt comfortable on her almost immediately.

The service was outstanding in all areas, except the dining rooms, where we
found it be spotty.

The food was found to be of artfully presented, but unexceptional quality
when it came to beef dishes. Fish and seafood lovers seemed to fare better.

Itinerary is what made this cruise for me. Superb and enjoyable ports. and
such a busy itinerary we really didn't get the chance to experience the ship
as much as we would have liked.

Now on to the FULL story..

I have been eyeing a Baltic Itinerary for some time, and noting it was the
300th Anniversary of St. Petersburg, I thought this was the perfect time to
visit. Traveling so far, we decided to pre-cruise a couple of days in
Stockholm, Sweden.

We stayed at the Radisson SAS Royal Viking Hotel; a pleasant, if
unspectacular, but well located hotel. Most of the prominent tourist spots
and museums were within walking distance of the hotel, and Mrs. Kuki and I
put a lot of miles on our Nikes.
We did a half day bus tour to get an overview of the city, but most of the
time just walked, and continued walking, taking in whatever sites we
happened upon.

Stockholm is a nice city, with seemingly friendly people, but most things,
from food to souvenirs struck us a fairly expensive. However, in my view,
it's a city worth visiting.

The ride from the hotel to the pier is only about 15 minutes, and when we
arrived at the pier, just prior to noon, and there seemed to be no other
passengers around. We showed our cruise tickets and I.D., went through X-ray
and security, and walked onboard. The remaining check in process was in the
Celebrity Theatre, and consisted of handing them a credit card, receiving
our cabin key/charge card, and in three minutes we were done.

They did inform us that our cabins would not be ready until 2:30, but
pointed us to the pool deck where lunch was being served. We didn't need to
be told twice, and away we went for our first taste of Radisson food, and
service at the poolside grill.
There was no standing in line at the grill. Staff at the grill took our
order for food and drinks, and told us to sit and make ourselves
comfortable.

I'm not sure exactly what I was expecting, but seeing the ship sitting at
the pier, and then walking onboard, there really was no WOW factor. Nothing
in the public areas around the atrium struck us as particularly spectacular,
until we got to our cabin. Seven Seas Voyager is an all suites all balconies
ship. Our cabin was a CAT F, standard suite, with a very comfortable layout
and color scheme, featuring grays, taupe's, a creamy green, and light wood
trim.

The real treat in these cabins is the incredible amount of storage space in
the cabin and in a full size walk in closet. That topped off by the nicest
bathroom I've seen on a ship.
The bathroom is completely done in marble, and aside from a full sized bath
tub, offers a separate glassed in shower stall. The shower was roomy and had
as much water pressure as my shower at home. This is an area where I find
many cruise ships suffer, but the Voyager was superb.

A bit more on cabin amenities later.

Fellow Passengers

This being my first Radisson Seven Seas cruise, I wasn't really sure
what/who to expect for fellow cruise mates. There was a somewhat surprising,
very broad cross section of age groups, with the average age not noticeably
different than what we've experienced on Celebrity, Princess, or even RCI
and Carnival.
The only exception, we only saw 15-20 kids under 18 onboard.

I will say, of the people we got the opportunity to talk to, we encountered
a very well traveled group. And they are not just cruise enthusiasts. They
seemed to love travel of any kind, and most were very travel savvy.

One might imagine a bit of a pretentious crowd on a luxury cruise, but this
was not apparent to us at all. Most everyone seemed friendly and more than
willing to chat at every opportunity, and it was very common to be greeted
by fellow passengers at all times, whether it was simply passing each other
in a hallway, or while sitting at tables near to each other in a lounge.
Though they were apparently a well heeled group. Possibly, because they were
on a luxury cruise, they may have had an expectation that they were in the
company of their peers. But, you never know as I was in their midst.

One thing I did notice was almost blind devotion and loyalty to Radisson
from many of the passengers we spoke to. Negative comments from past
Radisson passengers were rarely heard, and not looked kindly upon when made
by others.

What They Do Well. And Not So Well

Heading out on a "luxury" cruise on Radisson Seven Seas our expectations
were admittedly quite high. Considering the relatively high cost of such a
cruise I believe these high expectations to be justified.

What we found was not entirely perfection. On this ship there were things
they did very well, and quite different, compared to the "mass market"
lines, and there were areas where we felt they fell short of the mark.

Earlier I mentioned the ease of the check in/ embarkation process. One would
be hard pressed to find a more relaxed and efficient embarkation process.

Another major plus; without fail, each and every crew member we crossed
paths with throughout the ship made a point of greeting us. This was not
only very welcoming, but somehow also very comforting.

It was also a nice treat finding our shipboard charge card stayed in our
pockets the majority of the time. Sodas and bottled war are complimentary
throughout the ship; both in the cabin mini bars, and all of the lounges and
public areas.
House wines were complimentary at dinner, in all dining venues, as were a
number of after dinner drinks. Two bottles of your choice of alcohol are
complimentary for your in suite bar.

In fact, about the only time one had to pay for liquid refreshments, was for
the odd cocktail at the ship's bars and restaurants. The oddity in this
policy is that there is a charge for wine in the dining rooms during lunch
in the dining rooms and restaurants.

Basically Mrs Kuki and I don't drink much wine or liquor, so this policy did
not affect us directly.

Another nicety occurred on a sea day when there was a German themed buffet
poolside. The buffet that day had a most extensive selection, and they were
serving complimentary German beer this day throughout lunch.

On another occasion there was a "Martini Night" in one of the lounges, and
everyone present received a free Martini.

All of these were "nice touches", but when we had our CruiseMates group
cocktail party the appetizers offered were unimpressive, and quantities
skimpy. It was one of those moments, that just didn't add up, or fit, with
the way they did the majority of things on this ship.

Radisson Seven Seas features onboard self laundry, with complimentary
detergent automatically dispensed. These laundry rooms were, surprisingly,
very busy. I guess I didn't expect this "well heeled crowd" to be doing
their own laundry on a cruise, but I was proven wrong.

We encountered a strange phenomena with regard to elevators on the ship.
There are two sets of elevators on the ship. Two aft, on either side of the
staircase, and four of them forward, in the atrium.
The aft elevators are perhaps twelve feet apart, yet if you press the button
at one, to call an elevator, it is not synchronized with the other elevator.
Not an earth shattering problem, for certain, but none the less. odd.

The same situation repeats with the four atrium elevators. Only here it
seems the four are divided into two set ups. One call button reaching two of
the elevators. Another call button reaching the other two.

Mrs Kuki and I were invited to dine with the Captain on the Voyager. A very
gracious and friendly host, and an evening we enjoyed a lot. There were a
couple of things that surprised us about this evening.

Firstly, we were instructed to meet the social hostess outside of the
Compass Rose Dining Room, so we could be escorted into the dining room. An
invitation to dine with the Captain, in our past experience, is a bit of an
event. In this case, meeting in the hall, rather than in a lounge, for a
pre-dinner drink, minimized "the event", in my view.

On other lines this experience has been enhanced with drinks prior to
dinner, perhaps a rose for the ladies, and a souvenir photograph of the
group. Perhaps on Radisson they feel passengers aren't interested in a photo
of them with "the help", or perhaps no one wanted evidence of having dined
with me.

On a positive note, unlike the mass market cruise lines, who normally site
security concerns when they turn down requests to visit the bridge, the
Voyager has an open bridge policy on sea days. Any of the guests may tour
the bridge at these times, you do not have to wait for an invitation.

In contrast to this trusting position I did have to laugh in the casino when
I saw the dealers had to check all bills presented larger than 20s with a
special pen used to detect counterfeit money. So. they'll let any passenger
on the bridge, but when it comes to money, they want to make certain you're
not a crook.

Service

We found the service to have areas of strength, and surprisingly some
weakness. While one might have expected other areas to have some
shortcomings, I thought it reasonable to expect service to be close to
perfect throughout the ship.

The time we dined in Signatures (the ship's Cordon Bleu alternate
restaurant) service was indeed near to perfect. Even in Le Veranda (the
ship's buffet style restaurant) the level of service was acceptable, and on
occasion exceptional.

However, I was surprised to find service in The Compass Rose (the ship's
main dining room) to be rather spotty, with orders being taken wrong and
delivered to the wrong person. A few times we were offered bread or rolls
once when we sat down, but then had to ask if we wanted more. They should
either leave the bread basket on the table, or be sure to offer more
throughout the meal.

Normally, all these errors were relatively minor, and easy to correct. Yet,
the errors were more frequent than we expected.

Especially the first few nights, service in the Compass Rose was not better,
and perhaps worse, than my experiences on previous "mass market" cruises.
Though it did improve some as the cruise progressed.

Latitudes, the ship's other alternate restaurant seemed to be understaffed,
in regard to front end service staff. There was the Maitre 'D, a wine
sommelier, and six servers (a combination of waiters and ass't waiters).

In other areas of the ship, we experienced wonderful service, even exceeding
my high expectations, but food service was often spotty.

For buffet breakfasts in Le Veranda we never really had to stand in line
because it is not a typical buffet set up. Orders were taken at the buffet,
and servers brought your choices to your seat when the order was prepared.
There are no coffee or juice machines in this restaurant either.
Coffee, juice and other drinks are served at your table, once you are
seated.

This same system was in place at the poolside grill, except during the
themed lunch buffets, which produced fairly large crowds. Even then, when we
reached the end of the buffet line, a staff member was there to find a table
for us. We didn't have to wander around, with our food in hand, looking for
an open table.

Service in our cabin was exceptional. Our cabin stewards, Dorota and
Melchor, were efficient, and always smiling when we saw them. Leaving the
cabin in the morning, and being greeted with a huge smile, and a pleasant
greeting got our days off to a great start.

I carry my own thermal cup, when I travel, which I use for my coffee fix in
the morning. Dorota went so far as to wash this cup for me when she was
making up the cabin.

Radisson makes it very clear that tipping is not expected. In fact, they say
it is included in your fare. I did, however, notice on the last night of the
cruise, all the cabin stewards were available in the hallways, and we saw
many passengers tipping them, just as we did.

FOOD

The Voyager has a number of alternatives when it comes to dining. The main
dining room, Compass Rose, features open seating. Come whenever you chose,
during open operating hours (seating 7PM to 9PM), and dine with whomever you
like. The room is large enough to seat everyone, and we never saw any
waiting at all.

A couple of nights when it was just Mrs. Kuki and I entering, rather than
with a group, the Maitre D did make a point of asking if we wanted a table
for two, or would care to join others at a table.

I thought it was excellent service to ask this question, rather than just
assume we wanted a table for two.

Food itself, of course, is an area of personal taste, so it's wise to keep
in mind, that these are my thoughts. As the saying goes. your mileage may
vary.

The menus in all venues onboard are fairly exotic. However, I oddly found
the selections to be somewhat limited. Perhaps three appetizers, two salads,
one pasta, and three entrée choices. In addition there were "always
available" choices which consisted of a steak, fish, and pasta choice.

Fish and seafood lovers would probably be most satisfied with the menus.
Being a meat and potatoes guy, making selections was more of a challenge. My
personal tastes run to beef, veal, pork, chicken, and pasta. A number of
dining times I was surprised how often I had to revert to the "always
available" section of the menu. And frankly, I found the steak on that
portion of the menu to be less than exceptional.

A couple of times variations of beef tenderloin were offered, and they were
very good. Unfortunately other cuts of beef were of lesser quality. And
once, even though the quality of the tenderloin was excellent, it was so
bland to be disappointing.

Portions of everything seemed to be on the small side. Lobster tails were
small, and one night when Beef Wellington was offered, the portions were
tiny. and not particularly tender or tasty.

Presentation, on the other hand, was very artful. Everything always looked
great, with the taste, unfortunately, occasionally not matching that
standard. This was particularly true with desserts. They looked so fabulous,
I certainly never passed on the chance to taste them though.

One thing in this area, on Radisson that you won't find on any of the more
mass market cruise lines; with 24 hrs. notice you can pre-order pretty much
anything you want for dinner the next evening, whether it's on any of the
menus or not. The limiting factor, of course, would be that the ingredients
are onboard.


The Cordon Bleu restaurant onboard is Signatures. This is a reservations
only restaurant, but there is no extra charge. Both food and service here
were fabulous. Signatures has a set menu, that does not change throughout
the cruise, though selections seemed interesting and plentiful.

My thoughts though are that on a "luxury cruise", an alternate restaurant
should simply be a different choice, not an entirely different, higher level
of service and food quality from the other dining venues.

The ship offers one other alternate restaurant, Latitudes. Latitudes had
only one set seating each night, and the menu, though changing themes
nightly, was a set menu. You are limited to a choice of one of two entrees.
The rest of the menu. appetizer, soup, etc, is set. Your choice is simply
yes or no.

Though the theory of the restaurant is "cute", with an open galley where
guests watch the chefs prepare the meal, the final product, including the
service was, frankly, not that impressive.

The Cabin

Radisson calls the Voyager an all suites, all balconies ship, and they'd
likely be upset to see me referring to the suites as cabins. They are really
nice, and well designed cabins, that's for sure.

Aside from being tastefully furnished, they are well laid out as well. The s
tandard "suites" are 300 sq. ft., with a 50 sq. ft balcony. The highlight of
these cabins is without doubt the washrooms. Mostly marble finishes on the
floors, walls and vanities, and all have a full size bathtub, as well as a
separate free standing glass shower unit.

The bathroom is spacious and comfortable, with lots of storage space. And,
just as in fine hotels, there's even a telephone in the bathroom. I was
tempted to order room service to our washroom, thinking I could just flush
it, thereby skipping a step.

The cabin also has a walk in closet. It's very well organized with plenty of
hangars and shelf space, as well as a programmable personal safe.

The sitting area is large enough to be comfortable, with a full size sofa
and two side arm chairs, and a cocktail table. Against one wall is the desk,
and a cabinet stocked with glassware for drinks and wine glasses, with
drawers underneath, as well as a mini bar. There is no mirror on the wall
above the desk. That's saved for the vanity table located next to the bed,
in the other part of the cabin.

The bed was very comfortable, and the linens, pillows and duvet were of good
quality.

There is also a table top attachment which expands the size of the cocktail
table in the cabin, to allow for in suite dining.

Another nice amenity here. Aside from the telephone in the bathroom, there
are two other telephones. One next to the bed, and another on the desk, in
the sitting area. You're not scrambling out of bed, to trip your way to the
desk, if the telephone rings while you're sleeping.

The cabin has excellent lighting controls and individual climate controls,
which actually seemed to function in keeping the cabin as warm or as cool as
we chose.

Unfortunately, attached to this great cabin is a pretty small balcony, with
room for two chairs and a small table. The chairs are simple plastic resin
types, but do have cushions for some added comfort.

The BIG problem with this cabin should be rectified by the time you are
reading this report, because the ship is going into dry dock at the end of
Sept to repair a propeller which was damaged earlier in the Voyager's Baltic
season.

Unfortunately we had to live with this unfixed problem for our entire
cruise. The damaged propeller caused our cabin to shake dramatically most of
the time we were out at sea. It was so bad, we looked even more forward to
our port days.

It felt as though we were living inside the mouth of someone who's teeth
were chattering because of cold weather, and it did make for some sleepless
nights. I have been on ships that suffered from some vibration problems
before, but never experienced anything like this.

I'm surprised I didn't hear of a revolt of all the passengers living in the
aft end of the ship, because surely other suites in the area had to be
experiencing the same problems.
Radisson obviously knew of the problems, and thus the upcoming dry dock. I
would have expected them to offer some compensation to all passengers
located in the aft portion of the ship, who had paid significant dollars for
a luxury suite. and naturally wouldn't expect it to vibrate more vigorously
than the bed in a $20 motel.

As a matter of fact, half way through the cruise, half way comment cards
were left in the cabins, asking what Radisson could do to improve our
experience. I thought this was a nice touch, but was less impressed, when
after my rather dramatically negative comments, no one followed up and
contacted me to have any kind of discussion of my concerns. I thought this
made it rather obvious that they didn't read the comment cards.


Entertainment

I am not a "Vegas show" kind of guy, but I generally do like to attend the
"guest star" shows. In the case of the Seven Seas Voyager, and from feedback
from Mrs Kuki (who does attend most shows) I should have reversed my tact.

I saw a comedian and a magician who were both somewhat pathetic. The
comedian was telling jokes older than I tell. The magician must have been
pretty good at his craft, because he made me disappear half way through his
show.

Mrs. Kuki reported that the production shows were well done, with quality
costumes, sets and performers. She also told me about a fantastic violin
player who's performance I missed. But, so did the majority of passengers
apparently, because she estimated the audience to consist of about 35
people.

There was a guest lecturer onboard who also drew rave reviews, but the
timing of her lectures and presentations seemed to be odd (one was at 10 PM,
after a long day not for me), never matching my schedule, so I can't offer
any person opinions.

There were bridge classes and play, and computer classes, and tours of the
galley, etc. However, this was such a busy itinerary, I didn't even get
around to checking to see what types of participation they were getting.

On this cruise the itinerary really was the entertainment, so you'll forgive
me if the information in this section is a bit sketchy.

Lounges

As mentioned, because of the very port intensive itinerary our actual time
onboard the ship was somewhat limited, and much of it was spent sleeping,
recovering from exhaustive touring.

If I was spending more time onboard I'd have likely been less than impressed
with a couple of the lounges. The Voyager Lounge, outside the Compass Rose,
is long and narrow, and though it's supposed to function as the ship's
disco, it's physical layout certainly isn't conducive to that type of use.

Like the tiny, long and narrow, Connoisseur Cigar Bar, both seem to be
afterthoughts to fill minimal amounts of space.

The Horizon Lounge, located aft, is a larger venue, and featured dance
bands. Quite a nice physical set up. There are tables and chairs outside the
lounge on the stern, but unfortunately the weather wasn't conducive to us
taking advantage of them.

On Deck 11 forward the Observation Lounge offers the most pleasant
atmosphere of all the lounges, with comfortable furnishings and a panoramic
view. This is a non smoking lounge.

Though I happen to be a smoker, I think it's an excellent idea to have at
least one lounge onboard totally smoke free.


Overview

In many ways the Radisson Seven Seas Voyager displayed the differences
between a luxury cruise and a more mass market experience quite
dramatically.

In others, they fell short. Overall, I'd rate this ship an 7 ½ out of 10.
Pretty darn good, but I have rated previous cruises on less luxurious
cruises higher.

They do have room for improvement in the quality of their dining room food
and service. Being such a key area, and considering they refer to themselves
as a 6 Star cruise line, they should take steps to make changes.

Frankly, I'd be very interested in taking another Seven Seas cruise. I'd be
interested to follow up to see if my experiences were typical or anecdotal.

I have written, and submitted, a couple of articles about other facets of
this cruise, and they may be posted on the CruiseMates home page some time
soon, depending on if my editor likes themG


Regards,
Kuki
Features Editor
http://cruisemates.com
Internet Cruise Magazine
Fun and Friendship= http://www.cruisemates.com/articles/CMcruise

Thank you so much for this wonderful review. I've experienced all those Baltic
ports and was particularly interested in your extensive ship presentation. I'll
probably never do one of these cruises (Radisson, Seabourn, etc) because of the
$$$. So......I've lived vicarously through you. VBG

Arlene

"Kuki-Cruisemates.com" wrote:

Baltic itinerary, Stockholm, Sweden, to Rouen, France.

For those who want to see my quick synopsis of this cruise, without having
to read the "novella"..

On Sun, 14 Sep 2003 16:27:52 GMT, "Kuki-Cruisemates.com"
wrote:

Baltic itinerary, Stockholm, Sweden, to Rouen, France.

Thanks for a great review, Kuki. You cracked me up with the magician
joke



Mason Barge

"If this is coffee, please bring me some tea. If this is tea, please bring me some coffee."
-- Abraham Lincoln

Kuki, thanks for this very interesting review. We don't get to see many
reviews of the luxury ships on rtc. I enjoyed reading about your
experiences.

Eileen

Great review Kuki. After a 19 day cruise on Seabourn a few years ago,
with impeccable food and service (and complementary wines with lunch as
well as dinner), I swore off all 6 star cruising in the future. Your
review has convinced me that this was the right decision for us.

Howard

In article , Lee Sebel wrote:

Unless I win the lotto and can afford a big bucks cruiseline like
Crystal all our future cruise will be with HAL.

The first cruise always has a big wow factor but you should try some of
the other cruise lines for future cruises.

--
Charles

Wow. Thanks for the most excellent review!

I was very interested in reading it as it was a Radisson Seven Seas
offering that first got us thinking about cruising this past July. We
ended up choosing HAL's Zuiderdam instead based on the Western Caribbean
itinerary.

After reading your review I feel confident we made the right choice.

Reasons why:

Our aft cabin (not a suite) had a huge (relatively speaking) verandah
which we thoroughly enjoyed.

I could care less about marble finishes in the bathroom, and our combo
tub/shower suited us just fine. I'd rather have the space on the
verandah instead of in the loo.

From your description, it sounds like the food on the Zuiderdam was of
much higher caliber, with much greater selection and larger portions.
The least impressive offerings were still very good, and many of the
dishes were excellent. My wife and I both enjoyed twin lobster tails and
shared a sizable portion of very tasty Beef Wellington on the 2nd formal
night, and she felt she got her money's worth with 5 ounces of Sevruga
caviar that night which would have set us back some $300 to $400 in a
restaurant. As a meat and potatoes guy you would have swooned over the
steaks served in the Odyssey (though it does command a $20 cover per
person).

It was the free alcohol and tipping included that first attracted us to
RSS, but the tariff was about $600 per person more than our Zuiderdam
fare. We didn't come anywhere close to ringing up $1200 in drinks and
tips, so the value offered on the Zuiderdam was pretty impressive. Our
additional charges ran a bit over $700, almost totally offset by my
winnings at the craps table!

Granted we were on a much larger ship, but that just made for that much
more WOW factor...we found the Zuiderdam to be stunningly gorgeous from
stem to stern.

While I came away from our trip very much hooked on HAL, there was a
part of me that wanted to consider an RSS trip in the future to find out
what we might have missed. Your review saved me the trouble (and the
$$$), so thanks again for posting such a thorough report.

Unless I win the lotto and can afford a big bucks cruiseline like
Crystal all our future cruise will be with HAL.

Kuki-Cruisemates.com wrote:

Baltic itinerary, Stockholm, Sweden, to Rouen, France.

For those who want to see my quick synopsis of this cruise, without having
to read the "novella"..

This is not a drop dead gorgeous ship. There is no jaw dropping moment when
you see her exterior, or interior, for the first time. But she is tastefully
decorated, and we felt comfortable on her almost immediately.

The service was outstanding in all areas, except the dining rooms, where we
found it be spotty.

The food was found to be of artfully presented, but unexceptional quality
when it came to beef dishes. Fish and seafood lovers seemed to fare better.

Itinerary is what made this cruise for me. Superb and enjoyable ports. and
such a busy itinerary we really didn't get the chance to experience the ship
as much as we would have liked.

Now on to the FULL story..

I have been eyeing a Baltic Itinerary for some time, and noting it was the
300th Anniversary of St. Petersburg, I thought this was the perfect time to
visit. Traveling so far, we decided to pre-cruise a couple of days in
Stockholm, Sweden.

We stayed at the Radisson SAS Royal Viking Hotel; a pleasant, if
unspectacular, but well located hotel. Most of the prominent tourist spots
and museums were within walking distance of the hotel, and Mrs. Kuki and I
put a lot of miles on our Nikes.
We did a half day bus tour to get an overview of the city, but most of the
time just walked, and continued walking, taking in whatever sites we
happened upon.

Stockholm is a nice city, with seemingly friendly people, but most things,
from food to souvenirs struck us a fairly expensive. However, in my view,
it's a city worth visiting.

The ride from the hotel to the pier is only about 15 minutes, and when we
arrived at the pier, just prior to noon, and there seemed to be no other
passengers around. We showed our cruise tickets and I.D., went through X-ray
and security, and walked onboard. The remaining check in process was in the
Celebrity Theatre, and consisted of handing them a credit card, receiving
our cabin key/charge card, and in three minutes we were done.

They did inform us that our cabins would not be ready until 2:30, but
pointed us to the pool deck where lunch was being served. We didn't need to
be told twice, and away we went for our first taste of Radisson food, and
service at the poolside grill.
There was no standing in line at the grill. Staff at the grill took our
order for food and drinks, and told us to sit and make ourselves
comfortable.

I'm not sure exactly what I was expecting, but seeing the ship sitting at
the pier, and then walking onboard, there really was no WOW factor. Nothing
in the public areas around the atrium struck us as particularly spectacular,
until we got to our cabin. Seven Seas Voyager is an all suites all balconies
ship. Our cabin was a CAT F, standard suite, with a very comfortable layout
and color scheme, featuring grays, taupe's, a creamy green, and light wood
trim.

The real treat in these cabins is the incredible amount of storage space in
the cabin and in a full size walk in closet. That topped off by the nicest
bathroom I've seen on a ship.
The bathroom is completely done in marble, and aside from a full sized bath
tub, offers a separate glassed in shower stall. The shower was roomy and had
as much water pressure as my shower at home. This is an area where I find
many cruise ships suffer, but the Voyager was superb.

A bit more on cabin amenities later.

Fellow Passengers

This being my first Radisson Seven Seas cruise, I wasn't really sure
what/who to expect for fellow cruise mates. There was a somewhat surprising,
very broad cross section of age groups, with the average age not noticeably
different than what we've experienced on Celebrity, Princess, or even RCI
and Carnival.
The only exception, we only saw 15-20 kids under 18 onboard.

I will say, of the people we got the opportunity to talk to, we encountered
a very well traveled group. And they are not just cruise enthusiasts. They
seemed to love travel of any kind, and most were very travel savvy.

One might imagine a bit of a pretentious crowd on a luxury cruise, but this
was not apparent to us at all. Most everyone seemed friendly and more than
willing to chat at every opportunity, and it was very common to be greeted
by fellow passengers at all times, whether it was simply passing each other
in a hallway, or while sitting at tables near to each other in a lounge.
Though they were apparently a well heeled group. Possibly, because they were
on a luxury cruise, they may have had an expectation that they were in the
company of their peers. But, you never know as I was in their midst.

One thing I did notice was almost blind devotion and loyalty to Radisson
from many of the passengers we spoke to. Negative comments from past
Radisson passengers were rarely heard, and not looked kindly upon when made
by others.

What They Do Well. And Not So Well

Heading out on a "luxury" cruise on Radisson Seven Seas our expectations
were admittedly quite high. Considering the relatively high cost of such a
cruise I believe these high expectations to be justified.

What we found was not entirely perfection. On this ship there were things
they did very well, and quite different, compared to the "mass market"
lines, and there were areas where we felt they fell short of the mark.

Earlier I mentioned the ease of the check in/ embarkation process. One would
be hard pressed to find a more relaxed and efficient embarkation process.

Another major plus; without fail, each and every crew member we crossed
paths with throughout the ship made a point of greeting us. This was not
only very welcoming, but somehow also very comforting.

It was also a nice treat finding our shipboard charge card stayed in our
pockets the majority of the time. Sodas and bottled war are complimentary
throughout the ship; both in the cabin mini bars, and all of the lounges and
public areas.
House wines were complimentary at dinner, in all dining venues, as were a
number of after dinner drinks. Two bottles of your choice of alcohol are
complimentary for your in suite bar.

In fact, about the only time one had to pay for liquid refreshments, was for
the odd cocktail at the ship's bars and restaurants. The oddity in this
policy is that there is a charge for wine in the dining rooms during lunch
in the dining rooms and restaurants.

Basically Mrs Kuki and I don't drink much wine or liquor, so this policy did
not affect us directly.

Another nicety occurred on a sea day when there was a German themed buffet
poolside. The buffet that day had a most extensive selection, and they were
serving complimentary German beer this day throughout lunch.

On another occasion there was a "Martini Night" in one of the lounges, and
everyone present received a free Martini.

All of these were "nice touches", but when we had our CruiseMates group
cocktail party the appetizers offered were unimpressive, and quantities
skimpy. It was one of those moments, that just didn't add up, or fit, with
the way they did the majority of things on this ship.

Radisson Seven Seas features onboard self laundry, with complimentary
detergent automatically dispensed. These laundry rooms were, surprisingly,
very busy. I guess I didn't expect this "well heeled crowd" to be doing
their own laundry on a cruise, but I was proven wrong.

We encountered a strange phenomena with regard to elevators on the ship.
There are two sets of elevators on the ship. Two aft, on either side of the
staircase, and four of them forward, in the atrium.
The aft elevators are perhaps twelve feet apart, yet if you press the button
at one, to call an elevator, it is not synchronized with the other elevator.
Not an earth shattering problem, for certain, but none the less. odd.

The same situation repeats with the four atrium elevators. Only here it
seems the four are divided into two set ups. One call button reaching two of
the elevators. Another call button reaching the other two.

Mrs Kuki and I were invited to dine with the Captain on the Voyager. A very
gracious and friendly host, and an evening we enjoyed a lot. There were a
couple of things that surprised us about this evening.

Firstly, we were instructed to meet the social hostess outside of the
Compass Rose Dining Room, so we could be escorted into the dining room. An
invitation to dine with the Captain, in our past experience, is a bit of an
event. In this case, meeting in the hall, rather than in a lounge, for a
pre-dinner drink, minimized "the event", in my view.

On other lines this experience has been enhanced with drinks prior to
dinner, perhaps a rose for the ladies, and a souvenir photograph of the
group. Perhaps on Radisson they feel passengers aren't interested in a photo
of them with "the help", or perhaps no one wanted evidence of having dined
with me.

On a positive note, unlike the mass market cruise lines, who normally site
security concerns when they turn down requests to visit the bridge, the
Voyager has an open bridge policy on sea days. Any of the guests may tour
the bridge at these times, you do not have to wait for an invitation.

In contrast to this trusting position I did have to laugh in the casino when
I saw the dealers had to check all bills presented larger than 20s with a
special pen used to detect counterfeit money. So. they'll let any passenger
on the bridge, but when it comes to money, they want to make certain you're
not a crook.

Service

We found the service to have areas of strength, and surprisingly some
weakness. While one might have expected other areas to have some
shortcomings, I thought it reasonable to expect service to be close to
perfect throughout the ship.

The time we dined in Signatures (the ship's Cordon Bleu alternate
restaurant) service was indeed near to perfect. Even in Le Veranda (the
ship's buffet style restaurant) the level of service was acceptable, and on
occasion exceptional.

However, I was surprised to find service in The Compass Rose (the ship's
main dining room) to be rather spotty, with orders being taken wrong and
delivered to the wrong person. A few times we were offered bread or rolls
once when we sat down, but then had to ask if we wanted more. They should
either leave the bread basket on the table, or be sure to offer more
throughout the meal.

Normally, all these errors were relatively minor, and easy to correct. Yet,
the errors were more frequent than we expected.

Especially the first few nights, service in the Compass Rose was not better,
and perhaps worse, than my experiences on previous "mass market" cruises.
Though it did improve some as the cruise progressed.

Latitudes, the ship's other alternate restaurant seemed to be understaffed,
in regard to front end service staff. There was the Maitre 'D, a wine
sommelier, and six servers (a combination of waiters and ass't waiters).

In other areas of the ship, we experienced wonderful service, even exceeding
my high expectations, but food service was often spotty.

For buffet breakfasts in Le Veranda we never really had to stand in line
because it is not a typical buffet set up. Orders were taken at the buffet,
and servers brought your choices to your seat when the order was prepared.
There are no coffee or juice machines in this restaurant either.
Coffee, juice and other drinks are served at your table, once you are
seated.

This same system was in place at the poolside grill, except during the
themed lunch buffets, which produced fairly large crowds. Even then, when we
reached the end of the buffet line, a staff member was there to find a table
for us. We didn't have to wander around, with our food in hand, looking for
an open table.

Service in our cabin was exceptional. Our cabin stewards, Dorota and
Melchor, were efficient, and always smiling when we saw them. Leaving the
cabin in the morning, and being greeted with a huge smile, and a pleasant
greeting got our days off to a great start.

I carry my own thermal cup, when I travel, which I use for my coffee fix in
the morning. Dorota went so far as to wash this cup for me when she was
making up the cabin.

Radisson makes it very clear that tipping is not expected. In fact, they say
it is included in your fare. I did, however, notice on the last night of the
cruise, all the cabin stewards were available in the hallways, and we saw
many passengers tipping them, just as we did.

FOOD

The Voyager has a number of alternatives when it comes to dining. The main
dining room, Compass Rose, features open seating. Come whenever you chose,
during open operating hours (seating 7PM to 9PM), and dine with whomever you
like. The room is large enough to seat everyone, and we never saw any
waiting at all.

A couple of nights when it was just Mrs. Kuki and I entering, rather than
with a group, the Maitre D did make a point of asking if we wanted a table
for two, or would care to join others at a table.

I thought it was excellent service to ask this question, rather than just
assume we wanted a table for two.

Food itself, of course, is an area of personal taste, so it's wise to keep
in mind, that these are my thoughts. As the saying goes. your mileage may
vary.

The menus in all venues onboard are fairly exotic. However, I oddly found
the selections to be somewhat limited. Perhaps three appetizers, two salads,
one pasta, and three entrée choices. In addition there were "always
available" choices which consisted of a steak, fish, and pasta choice.

Fish and seafood lovers would probably be most satisfied with the menus.
Being a meat and potatoes guy, making selections was more of a challenge. My
personal tastes run to beef, veal, pork, chicken, and pasta. A number of
dining times I was surprised how often I had to revert to the "always
available" section of the menu. And frankly, I found the steak on that
portion of the menu to be less than exceptional.

A couple of times variations of beef tenderloin were offered, and they were
very good. Unfortunately other cuts of beef were of lesser quality. And
once, even though the quality of the tenderloin was excellent, it was so
bland to be disappointing.

Portions of everything seemed to be on the small side. Lobster tails were
small, and one night when Beef Wellington was offered, the portions were
tiny. and not particularly tender or tasty.

Presentation, on the other hand, was very artful. Everything always looked
great, with the taste, unfortunately, occasionally not matching that
standard. This was particularly true with desserts. They looked so fabulous,
I certainly never passed on the chance to taste them though.

One thing in this area, on Radisson that you won't find on any of the more
mass market cruise lines; with 24 hrs. notice you can pre-order pretty much
anything you want for dinner the next evening, whether it's on any of the
menus or not. The limiting factor, of course, would be that the ingredients
are onboard.


The Cordon Bleu restaurant onboard is Signatures. This is a reservations
only restaurant, but there is no extra charge. Both food and service here
were fabulous. Signatures has a set menu, that does not change throughout
the cruise, though selections seemed interesting and plentiful.

My thoughts though are that on a "luxury cruise", an alternate restaurant
should simply be a different choice, not an entirely different, higher level
of service and food quality from the other dining venues.

The ship offers one other alternate restaurant, Latitudes. Latitudes had
only one set seating each night, and the menu, though changing themes
nightly, was a set menu. You are limited to a choice of one of two entrees.
The rest of the menu. appetizer, soup, etc, is set. Your choice is simply
yes or no.

Though the theory of the restaurant is "cute", with an open galley where
guests watch the chefs prepare the meal, the final product, including the
service was, frankly, not that impressive.

The Cabin

Radisson calls the Voyager an all suites, all balconies ship, and they'd
likely be upset to see me referring to the suites as cabins. They are really
nice, and well designed cabins, that's for sure.

Aside from being tastefully furnished, they are well laid out as well. The s
tandard "suites" are 300 sq. ft., with a 50 sq. ft balcony. The highlight of
these cabins is without doubt the washrooms. Mostly marble finishes on the
floors, walls and vanities, and all have a full size bathtub, as well as a
separate free standing glass shower unit.

The bathroom is spacious and comfortable, with lots of storage space. And,
just as in fine hotels, there's even a telephone in the bathroom. I was
tempted to order room service to our washroom, thinking I could just flush
it, thereby skipping a step.

The cabin also has a walk in closet. It's very well organized with plenty of
hangars and shelf space, as well as a programmable personal safe.

The sitting area is large enough to be comfortable, with a full size sofa
and two side arm chairs, and a cocktail table. Against one wall is the desk,
and a cabinet stocked with glassware for drinks and wine glasses, with
drawers underneath, as well as a mini bar. There is no mirror on the wall
above the desk. That's saved for the vanity table located next to the bed,
in the other part of the cabin.

The bed was very comfortable, and the linens, pillows and duvet were of good
quality.

There is also a table top attachment which expands the size of the cocktail
table in the cabin, to allow for in suite dining.

Another nice amenity here. Aside from the telephone in the bathroom, there
are two other telephones. One next to the bed, and another on the desk, in
the sitting area. You're not scrambling out of bed, to trip your way to the
desk, if the telephone rings while you're sleeping.

The cabin has excellent lighting controls and individual climate controls,
which actually seemed to function in keeping the cabin as warm or as cool as
we chose.

Unfortunately, attached to this great cabin is a pretty small balcony, with
room for two chairs and a small table. The chairs are simple plastic resin
types, but do have cushions for some added comfort.

The BIG problem with this cabin should be rectified by the time you are
reading this report, because the ship is going into dry dock at the end of
Sept to repair a propeller which was damaged earlier in the Voyager's Baltic
season.

Unfortunately we had to live with this unfixed problem for our entire
cruise. The damaged propeller caused our cabin to shake dramatically most of
the time we were out at sea. It was so bad, we looked even more forward to
our port days.

It felt as though we were living inside the mouth of someone who's teeth
were chattering because of cold weather, and it did make for some sleepless
nights. I have been on ships that suffered from some vibration problems
before, but never experienced anything like this.

I'm surprised I didn't hear of a revolt of all the passengers living in the
aft end of the ship, because surely other suites in the area had to be
experiencing the same problems.
Radisson obviously knew of the problems, and thus the upcoming dry dock. I
would have expected them to offer some compensation to all passengers
located in the aft portion of the ship, who had paid significant dollars for
a luxury suite. and naturally wouldn't expect it to vibrate more vigorously
than the bed in a $20 motel.

As a matter of fact, half way through the cruise, half way comment cards
were left in the cabins, asking what Radisson could do to improve our
experience. I thought this was a nice touch, but was less impressed, when
after my rather dramatically negative comments, no one followed up and
contacted me to have any kind of discussion of my concerns. I thought this
made it rather obvious that they didn't read the comment cards.


Entertainment

I am not a "Vegas show" kind of guy, but I generally do like to attend the
"guest star" shows. In the case of the Seven Seas Voyager, and from feedback
from Mrs Kuki (who does attend most shows) I should have reversed my tact.

I saw a comedian and a magician who were both somewhat pathetic. The
comedian was telling jokes older than I tell. The magician must have been
pretty good at his craft, because he made me disappear half way through his
show.

Mrs. Kuki reported that the production shows were well done, with quality
costumes, sets and performers. She also told me about a fantastic violin
player who's performance I missed. But, so did the majority of passengers
apparently, because she estimated the audience to consist of about 35
people.

There was a guest lecturer onboard who also drew rave reviews, but the
timing of her lectures and presentations seemed to be odd (one was at 10 PM,
after a long day not for me), never matching my schedule, so I can't offer
any person opinions.

There were bridge classes and play, and computer classes, and tours of the
galley, etc. However, this was such a busy itinerary, I didn't even get
around to checking to see what types of participation they were getting.

On this cruise the itinerary really was the entertainment, so you'll forgive
me if the information in this section is a bit sketchy.

Lounges

As mentioned, because of the very port intensive itinerary our actual time
onboard the ship was somewhat limited, and much of it was spent sleeping,
recovering from exhaustive touring.

If I was spending more time onboard I'd have likely been less than impressed
with a couple of the lounges. The Voyager Lounge, outside the Compass Rose,
is long and narrow, and though it's supposed to function as the ship's
disco, it's physical layout certainly isn't conducive to that type of use.

Like the tiny, long and narrow, Connoisseur Cigar Bar, both seem to be
afterthoughts to fill minimal amounts of space.

The Horizon Lounge, located aft, is a larger venue, and featured dance
bands. Quite a nice physical set up. There are tables and chairs outside the
lounge on the stern, but unfortunately the weather wasn't conducive to us
taking advantage of them.

On Deck 11 forward the Observation Lounge offers the most pleasant
atmosphere of all the lounges, with comfortable furnishings and a panoramic
view. This is a non smoking lounge.

Though I happen to be a smoker, I think it's an excellent idea to have at
least one lounge onboard totally smoke free.


Overview

In many ways the Radisson Seven Seas Voyager displayed the differences
between a luxury cruise and a more mass market experience quite
dramatically.

In others, they fell short. Overall, I'd rate this ship an 7 ½ out of 10.
Pretty darn good, but I have rated previous cruises on less luxurious
cruises higher.

They do have room for improvement in the quality of their dining room food
and service. Being such a key area, and considering they refer to themselves
as a 6 Star cruise line, they should take steps to make changes.

Frankly, I'd be very interested in taking another Seven Seas cruise. I'd be
interested to follow up to see if my experiences were typical or anecdotal.

I have written, and submitted, a couple of articles about other facets of
this cruise, and they may be posted on the CruiseMates home page some time
soon, depending on if my editor likes themG


Regards,
Kuki
Features Editor
http://cruisemates.com
Internet Cruise Magazine
Fun and Friendship= http://www.cruisemates.com/articles/CMcruise







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Good job as always Kuki. You're always a good read.

Jeff

Kuki,
Thanks for the excellent review! While the cruise sounded lovely, the one
message I gathered from your review was that RSSC was not quite worth the
extra money? As you mentioned, you had given some mainstream cruise ships a
higher rating. To me, this would be unacceptable. I would expect the
rating to be as close to a "10" as possible. Nothing is perfect, but
somewhere along the line the value has to be in-line with the price.

I sailed on Silversea last year, and I can say without hesitation the cruise
rated a 9 1/2 out of 10! It was as close to perfect as I think a cruise
could come. I think the fact that Silversea ships are so much smaller makes
a big difference. 250 passengers compared to 700 is a fairly large gap, and
I think it enables Silversea to offer more personalized service and of
course food made to order. It was truly like being at a Ritz Carlton for
two weeks!

Silversea also places a comment card in your "suite" around the 3rd or 4th
day of the cruise. I was impressed they were very concerned to make
everything "perfect" while they still had the chance to correct any
concerns. Unlike RSSC, I received a wonderful written response from the
Hotel Director to my few concerns the very next day, and better yet, my
concerns were addressed and rectified where possible. Very classy! My
concerns were nothing major. I gave our wonderful Scandinavian stewardess
very high praise, so the Hotel Director was able to give her a commendation
letter. The other concerns were that the gym was too small and I suggesting
moving it to the underused Observation Lounge. While I knew nothing could
be done during my cruise regarding this issue, I was told it was being
considered. Interestingly enough, during the SILVER CLOUD and SILVER WIND
refits, this change was accommodated! Silversea really does listen! My
other concerns were a balcony door that did not close properly, and the
shower in the gym/spa was not very clean. Both were taken care of the very
next day.

I do hope to try RSSC someday, but I have to admit I would expect them to
offer a far higher standard than something like Celebrity or Holland America
for the price. Silversea certainly was.

Thanks again for the review.

Best,
Ernie







"Kuki-Cruisemates.com" wrote in message
news:cG09b.4418$VS2.2322@pd7tw1no...

Frankly, I'd be very interested in taking another Seven Seas cruise. I'd
be
interested to follow up to see if my experiences were typical or
anecdotal.

I have written, and submitted, a couple of articles about other facets of
this cruise, and they may be posted on the CruiseMates home page some time
soon, depending on if my editor likes themG


Regards,
Kuki

Kuki,

Thanks for posting this great review. Out of curiousity, how would you
rate our Transatlanic cruise on Constellation. Just wondering how they
compare....

My best to Mrs. Kuki,

Linda