Marina Review

Best cuisine at sea?

Review for the South Pacific Cruise on Marina
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mountainclimber1
6-10 Cruises • Age 70s

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Sail Date: Jan 2019
Cabin: Penthouse Suite

Yes, Oceania has the best cuisine at sea, unless you are health conscientious. Overweight and obese passengers were in pig heaven on Marina. We personally found the food way too salty, too heavy with too much butter and too much sweet stuff. For the first time on a cruise we had trouble finding something that appealed to us. We personally love fruits, nuts, vegetables, good bred, fresh fish; Mediterranean, Indian, Thai, Chinese and Japanese cuisine. Fruits on the Marina were mostly limited to melons and a little pineapple. Bananas were green or otherwise inedible, as we were told the Marina tried to avoid catering locally and practically all provisions on board were deep frozen. Only rarely was a fresh local fish on the menu. Bread for breakfast consisted mainly of fatty, sweet pastry, I got nauseous just looking at it. Fresh omelettes were fried in butter, the burnt butter was sticking in black spots to the dish, ugh. Frying eggs in butter is unacceptable to us. Fresh oatmeal was a heavy creamy substance that didn't resemble oatmeal. We have never eaten as poor on a cruise as on this one, maybe we had been too spoiled on Silversea or our Regent cruises, but these other cruise line don't boast the best cuisine at sea. But we must admit, the great majority of the passengers on the Marina craved the food, they loved it. They got their moneys worth of salt, sugar and fat and were thus able to accumulate more additional pounds. The clientele on the Marina was different from the other cruises we were used to and preferred. The ship was too big for our liking; we love the smaller ships, where we get to know and recognise most of the passengers and crew after just a few days. The ship itself was excellent, beautifully maintained and a pleasure to sail on. We did love our Penthouse Suite, this is the way to travel. We had no need of the butler, we just loved the spaciousness of the suite high up on deck 11. The staff was excellent and well managed. We did find the sommeliers were under too much pressure to sell the more expensive wines. Oceania is not very "inclusivy"; our suite had 3 free laundry bags offered for our cruise, 3 days for the return of the laundry was too long for us. We preferred the self service laundry which my wife could finish in one day. For the self service laundry Oceania charged 2 $ for washing and another 2 $ for drying, wow, that was another first for us. We did find the shore excursions too expensive and had made our own arrangements. Would we choose Oceania again? No. But we can recommend Oceania without reservations to people who love big chunk of meats, hamburgers, hot dogs, thick french fries and lots of sweets; on Oceania you can get your moneys worth.

Cabin Review

Penthouse Suite

Cabin PH1

Loved the cabin. That was pure luxury with an excellent service. We had no use of the friendly and professional butler. We like to set things in motion ourselves. Too bad my wife couldn't even order her cappuccino in the early morning from the butler, as the soy milk she likes in her coffee was full of sugar. She got her coffee herself at the close by executive lounge with cow-milk, alas.

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