Oceania Trip

Our first taste of Oceania

Sarita and I were both invited by Kal from the Oceania team to join the beautiful Oceania Vista cruise ship. Now, we’ve experienced cruising before with Virgin Voyages and a few others, but this was our first taste of true luxury cruising. And what an experience it was! The food, the entertainment and the staff were all incredible. Take a look below to find out a little more about our trip and why you may want to consider an Oceania cruise in the future. We also filmed an interview with Kal from the Oceania team, which you can watch alongside our trip videos.

The cruise itself started in Southampton and visited several other locations before we joined the trip, but joining from Cork was the best option for our schedules. We arrived in Cork on 6 August, the day before we boarded. Arriving a day early is something we always advise our cruise customers to do, and it gave us time to explore the city without worrying about missing the ship! Cork itself was beautiful, with so much character and some delicious food. We did a little filming while there and got a good night’s sleep for the cruise ahead.

Welcome aboard Vista

The following day, 7 August, we grabbed some breakfast and took a taxi over to Ringaskiddy to hop on board. Embarkation was a little different to what most customers would experience as we were joining halfway through the cruise. The port authorities took our luggage and had it delivered to the ship while we made our way on board. And when we stepped inside, oh my, what an incredible atrium! There was this huge glass sculpture that twisted up several floors. Quite the spectacle!

The room we had was a Concierge Veranda. You may be wondering why I called it a room and not a cabin. Well, ours felt more like a hotel room than a cramped cabin. The balcony was lovely, the sofa was amazing, the bathroom was incredible and the bed? Well, Oceania’s beds are so comfortable that they actually sell them to customers separately! The shower was a full walk-in shower too! We love Virgin, but their showers are more like cramped tubes in comparison. Anyway, take a look at our Concierge Veranda room tour if you’d like a proper look around.

Dinner and a show

We then decided to explore the ship, meet up with some fellow consultants and get together in the evening for an incredible meal. Oceania Vista has several speciality dining restaurants, which are included in your fare, by the way, and on our first night we were visiting what turned out to be the best restaurant on board (in our opinion anyway). Red Ginger is the Asian fusion restaurant, and it really was a fusion. We enjoyed sushi, Thai curry, kimchi and so many other things. It truly was delicious and the service was impeccable. If there’s one restaurant you need to visit when on board, it’s this one!

Afterwards, we were invited to the Vista Lounge for a show. When I say show, I mean a proper Broadway-style show! It was incredible. No expense spared. They had all the lighting and equipment, plenty of seats for everyone and a talented set of dancers and singers. They had several shows on board while we were sailing, but the around-the-world one was a particular favourite. Of course, we were visiting Liverpool too, and on that night they had a specialist Beatles show as well. Very entertaining!

Life on board

Later in the week, we filmed a full ship tour of Vista. It took us a while to put together and we think it’s pretty comprehensive. The ship is very modern with plenty of facilities and staff for the guests. We were on quite a full sailing, but it certainly didn’t feel like it. The top deck has a golf putting green, pickleball court and even a cornhole game. The ship also has its own gym and an incredible spa facility which we made good use of during our time on board.

I’ve mentioned Red Ginger already, but all of the dining facilities on board are absolutely world-class. Oceania’s tagline is “The Finest Cuisine at Sea”, which is quite a bold statement, but honestly, I can’t fault them. The food we’ve eaten on Virgin has been amazing, but Oceania was on another level. I ate escargot at Jacques, a massive rib-eye steak at Polo Grill and pasta at Toscana. We also experienced the Grand Dining Room, Terrace Café, Aquamar Kitchen and Waves Grill. All incredible in their own ways. To give you an idea of the attention to detail that goes into these restaurants, Toscana had Versace plates!

Days ashore

We joined the ship at Cork (Ringaskiddy), then visited five more ports with Oceania: Waterford, Holyhead, Liverpool, Dublin (Dún Laoghaire) and Belfast. We’d already explored Holyhead and Liverpool on previous trips, but absolutely loved our stops in Ireland. Dublin in particular was a lot of fun. We did the typical tourist thing of visiting Temple Bar and spending a fortune on drinks, finishing off with the Guinness factory tour, which was a lot better than we expected! You can come along with us in our Dublin in a day video. Belfast in Northern Ireland was actually even better than that. We visited the Titanic museum and it’s quite simply the best museum Sarita and I have ever visited. Oh, and we had to catch a Paddywagon tour to see the Giant’s Causeway. It would have been rude not to! We’ve got videos and pictures to remember it all. After five nights on board, we disembarked in Belfast on 12 August and flew home the following day.

What stayed with us

Overall, Sarita and I were blown away by Oceania. I’m not going to lie, we did go in thinking it would be another classic-style ship with all the usual clichés that go with it. But while most guests were a fair bit older than us, the ship and crew didn’t make it feel like that. There were always things to do, and some of the bar staff were hilarious! Speaking of drinks, I’ve not even gone into detail about the various bars that are on board, but maybe another time. We’d put Oceania very high on our list of cruise lines we must return to. Luxury cruising really is something you have to experience, and honestly, the prices aren’t that bad when you consider everything that’s included.

On our sailing, our meals, including the speciality restaurants, and basic Wi-Fi were included. We paid to upgrade the Wi-Fi and added a drinks package to keep the entertainment going! Excursions were extra too. Inclusions vary by booking offer, so it’s worth checking what comes with yours: current packages can include a choice of wine and beer with lunch and dinner or shore-excursion credit.

Would we recommend it?

Personally, I’d recommend Oceania to experienced cruisers looking for something a bit more luxurious. It wouldn’t necessarily be my first recommendation for someone new to cruising, although I think it could be a great fit for an older first-time cruiser.

If you’re interested in an Oceania cruise, or just have some questions, send us an enquiry today or call/message 07809 726738.