Cruise and Maritime Baltic Cruise September 2015

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cruisingtoski
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Cruise and Maritime Baltic Cruise September 2015

#1

Post by cruisingtoski »

I've just found this review of my Sept 2015 Baltic cities and Saint Petersburg cruise on the Magellan. It's a bit late but some may find it of interest.

Having read GillW's excellent review of her short cruise on the ship firstly I'd like to say that I agree completely with all she's said and that I'll try to keep my comments centred on my experiences on a longer voyage and as a single traveller.

Embarkation
I opted to take advantage of the coach transfer from Victoria Coach Station to Tilbury, which at £25 return I thought represented very good value for money. Joining the coach at Victoria was a little chaotic but once at Tilbury embarkation was a seamless process and I was quickly on board and in my cabin, my suitcases arrived soon after.

Cabin
I had booked an outside deluxe single cabin and was expecting a single cabin so was very pleased to find I had a good size double cabin. The cabin had a good size wardrobe with ample shelving, there were not many coat hangers but my cabin steward quickly produced more when I asked him. The safe for some bizarre reason was on the top shelf which as I am not very tall meant it was difficult to use. There were no tea or coffee making facilities in the room but for some odd reason a rather expensive mini bar consisting of mineral water, crisps, and biscuits!

Crew
As gill found on her cruise the captain generally was just a disembodied voice over the tannoy!
However he did appear on the captains welcome cocktails and was available for photographs, no choice over whether we wanted one taken, if you wanted a free drink then you had to have your photograph taken!
Also my table was next to the captains table so we saw him again on a couple of occasions when he was hosting dinners.

Singles
There was a singles meet the day after embarkation and a cocktail party later in the cruise. I didn't attend the first so didn't get an invitation to the second. There didn't appear to be any other singles events organised but this was a port intensive cruise so free time was limited.

Food
I ate in the buffet for breakfast and lunch and in the MDR for dinner. Imo the breakfast was excellent with a fresh egg station and the omelettes were possibly the best I have had on cruise ships. Lunch was mediocre but as I am more a breakfast than a lunch person the buffet was more than adequate for a snack. I opted for late sitting on a table of 8 and as has happened on other ships my fellow table companions were all singles.

Drinks
Drinks were I think a little more expensive than P and O (in 2014) and I decided to opt for the drinks package (£17 ppd). A cocktail plus a couple of glasses of wine with dinner and the occasional glass of wine or soft drink during the day just about put me in profit. The wine included in the package, was as one would expect house wine but it was perfectly acceptable even if not very exciting

Excursions
I chose to do the ships excursions in all the ports. They were a little pricey but when travelling solo in unfamiliar ports for me it works better than DIY. Disembarking for the excursions ran smoothly in all but one port where we had a similar experience to Gill's in Amsterdam. We were a little late docking, the gangway had just been cleared and non tour passengers were starting to disembark when they called for the first tour. To say it was chaos would be an understatement, there was an announcement asking all non tour passengers to wait but this was ignored. There were converging queues from deck 5 to deck 3, crew resorted to moving within the queues only allowing people with excursion tickets to proceed! This of course resulted in a number of very unhappy people. So no lessons learnt from the experience in Amsterdam!

Overall
Firstly a couple of downsides, which I think for me were:
The lack of tea and coffee making facilities in the cabin,
Very few, around 11 I believe, balcony cabins and these were all suites or mini suites.
Although on this particular cruise an outside was just fine but for a cruise to warmer climes or a longer cruise I would like the option of a balcony cabin without having to pay for a minisuites or above. In my opinion the size and facilities are fine for cruises of a couple of weeks or less but maybe not for a longer cruise. I believe CMV intend to use Magellan for a round the world cruise in 2017, it may work but I certainly would not consider it.
However that said in my opinion this particular cruise represented very good value for money. There were the usual moaners who said it was not like Cunard, P and O etc but...we were not paying Cunard, P and O prices! As a single I only paid a few hundred pounds more than the per person price (P and O for example often charge in excess of 70% supplement).
Would I go with CMV again, yes I definitely would given the right itinerary.
Denise

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Gill W
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Re: Cruise and Maritime Baltic Cruise September 2015

#2

Post by Gill W »

Hi, Denise

I enjoyed reading your report - it's a shame they hadn't learned from Amsterdam!

I was pleasantly surprised with my CMV short cruise. It's not a luxury line, but it was excellent value for money, and everything was very nicely done.

Next year, we have booked a week on their new ship Columbus (previously Arcadia and Ocean Village in previous life), going up to the Shetlands.

I don't think I'd choose a long voyage on Magellen, but CMV is great for a 'top-up' cruise.

CMV offer a product that people on forums say they want - a traditional cruise, with three dress codes, on smaller ships, with regional departure points.

Yet in some quarters, I've detected a hint of looking down on CMV. I don't know why this is - the passengers on CMV are exactly the same as the people you'd find on P&O (actually, this may or may not be a good thing! :lol: ) and the on board atmosphere is very pleasant. It's worth putting preconceptions aside, and giving them a try.
Gill

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Dark Knight
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Re: Cruise and Maritime Baltic Cruise September 2015

#3

Post by Dark Knight »

We board Magellan on Friday for a 2 week Baltic cruise and we are going with an open mind and without any preconceptions
It always makes me laugh when the cruise experts on here run down ships they have never been on or try to make smart a*se comments with no knowledge of anything but their beloved PandO but think they have the right to belittle other people's choice of holiday
We will enjoy it just like we have all our other cruises and make up our own minds based on actual experience and not by having seen a ship in Port and becoming an instant cruise snob :-)
Nihil Obstat

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Mervyn and Trish
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Re: Cruise and Maritime Baltic Cruise September 2015

#4

Post by Mervyn and Trish »

Magellan deffo not for us. We like our balcony. But we'll certainly give Columbus a look.


Quizzical Bob
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Re: Cruise and Maritime Baltic Cruise September 2015

#5

Post by Quizzical Bob »

Dark Knight wrote:
We board Magellan on Friday for a 2 week Baltic cruise and we are going with an open mind and without any preconceptions
It always makes me laugh when the cruise experts on here run down ships they have never been on or try to make smart a*se comments with no knowledge of anything but their beloved PandO but think they have the right to belittle other people's choice of holiday
We will enjoy it just like we have all our other cruises and make up our own minds based on actual experience and not by having seen a ship in Port and becoming an instant cruise snob :-)
I know this ship very well indeed. We installed one of my electronic signs on it whilst it was being fitted out in Ålborg Wærft in Northern Denmark in 1985. I'd be very surprised it it's still there but if you look over the top of the lifts on Deck 9 outside the casino you might see archeological evidence of its existence. During the sea trials they found out that the C of G was one metre too high so they spent several hours loading tons of pig iron onto the keel. It was the first of the modern ships to be built by Carnival and represented quite a risk for them at the time. The rest is history. I have extensive photos of it during its construction if you're interested. The engines are particular interesting.

Have a great cruise!

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Silver_Shiney
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Re: Cruise and Maritime Baltic Cruise September 2015

#6

Post by Silver_Shiney »

Quizzical Bob wrote:
I know this ship very well indeed. We installed one of my electronic signs on it whilst it was being fitted out in Ålborg Wærft in Northern Denmark in 1985. I'd be very surprised it it's still there but if you look over the top of the lifts on Deck 9 outside the casino you might see archeological evidence of its existence. During the sea trials they found out that the C of G was one metre too high so they spent several hours loading tons of pig iron onto the keel. It was the first of the modern ships to be built by Carnival and represented quite a risk for them at the time. The rest is history. I have extensive photos of it during its construction if you're interested. The engines are particular interesting.

Have a great cruise!
I, for one, would be very interested in seeing your photos, Bob
Alan

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