This was our first cruise on Oceania taking their 10 day Baltic Sea Beauty itinerary from Southampton to Copenhagen in July.
We chose a Concierge level balcony cabin on deck 9.
Embarkation was very quick, we were on board in 20 minutes and eating lunch in Aquamar kitchen within 30 minutes.
Although Oceania had carried out refurbishment of Marina during May this did not apply to balcony cabins and below and the dark wood cabinetry showed scratches and chips whilst the bathroom had not been upgraded to the large showers on Riviera and the Vista class ships.
Nevertheless the bathroom was in good order and included a bath and separate shower albeit the latter proved a bit tight for a 6 ft 13 stone frame but manageable.
Otherwise the cabin and balcony was a generous size compared to Sky Princess or Britannia.
Firstly the positives, service from all the on board staff was excellent quite the best we’ve ever experienced.
We found the entertainment very good from the theatre company, the guest entertainers and piano singer with lots of places to sit in the evening throughout the ship.
Space around the pool was equally generous and space on comfy loungers both in the sun and shade could always be easily found.
Breakfast we used room service, Waves Grill and Aquamar Kitchen all were excellent especially the fruit plates.
Lunches in both locations were equally good.
Our dinners we took in the Grand Dining Room and the Speciality Restaurants.
The GDR meals were very enjoyable and the room ambience pleasant and not noisy at all.
We managed to book all the Specialty Restaurants once albeit with somewhat later times than we had hoped given the concierge advantage of booking 60 days out from the sail date.
Toscana was our best meal by far, albeit the lobster tagliatelle, served spectacularly in shell, was a bit tough and chewy, a common issue with lobster throughout the venues, a first world problem maybe but Oceania tout their cuisine as best at sea! In fact all the Specialty Restaurants were disappointing to a significant extent despite some standout dishes like the sea bass in Red Ginger.
It maybe that we could have made better meal choices but how were first time cruisers to know? The other issue was the level of noise in these Specialty Restaurants was too high many tables almost engaging in shouting matches.
About 90% of the passengers were from North America and on the second leg of a multi segment voyage and whilst we enjoyed the company of many couples the overall experience did suffer a little from the predominance of one culture.
The Itinerary was very good having 9 ports of call many new to us and making for a very enjoyable cruise, standouts were Gothenburg, Visby, Klaipeda and Stockholm.
Would we cruise on Oceania again? The cost is high at Circa £400 pd each service levels are outstanding but dining was a mixed experience.
We have cruises booked on Cunard and Princess in 2025 in Club Class where the no wait dining experience may be replicated at circa half the Oceania cost per day so we will wait and see, The Jury is out until then.
