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Avoid this cruise like the plague! |
| Reviewed By: Vockings, Oldland Common,Bristol on 16th Apr 2008 |
| Cruise Line: Costa Cruises |
Times cruised before: 3-5 |
| Cruise Ship: Costa Romantica |
Sailed:
February,
2008 |
| Destination: Dubai |
Age: 26-35 |
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Having cruised quite a few times with Princess,we fancied a change and decided to see what else was on offer by choosing Costa Cruises-what a mistake!The service was abysmal-mainly,it seemed,because we were English,and they did not seem to like the English much,or have a grasp of the language.
They treated us like third class passengers and pretty much ignored us if they could.They would serve other people at bars and at open sitting dining before us or would pretend that they did not understand us!The food was pretty awful-they had no idea how to cook a steak,their pasta(at which they should excel,I thought) was not al dente-it was undercooked,the presentation was also pretty dire.Their pizza parlour only allowed you to have certain types on certain days so there was only four to choose from at any one time,and it only opened in the evenings.They changed the mealtimes every day so you never knew where you were!There was not 24 hour dining as it said in the brochure.The lunchtime buffet was limited and disgusting slop.The only nice food was the lunchtime burger bar!The bar tariff was extremely expensive and limited compared to Princess.
The cabin,however, was excellent-very big with a huge bathroom and lots of storage space.The air con was useless though.The steward was really helpful but was not able to supply a feather pillow because they did not have any as they were only for people with suites!Also,the steward had so many cabins to look after that you could wait all day to have your room serviced.
As we are quite young(ish)we usually like to visit the nightclub however,this one was like the Marie Celeste.They were playing some wierd garage music so no-one could dance to it anyway-if anyone had stayed for more than 5 minutes!
The service in the restaurant was very offhand and sometimes downright rude (from parmesan that I had had to ask for as it wasn't offered, being virtually thrown onto my pasta,to walking the length of the restaurant and not being shown to a table)apart from in the evenings when we had our set table and same waiters.At the pursers desk they were just as bad-halfway through dealing with a query about our luggage they had lost,the phone rang,so the person proceeded to leave us to answer it and wave us over to another member of staff to start explaining our problem again!We also had to tell them 3 times what our onwards travel arrangements were.
The excursions were plentiful but expensive,however,they were not interested in you if you were making independent arrangements-the maps supplied had no places to visit on them and did not even show where the 5 Euro shuttle bus had dropped you off!One time they gave a map which was a different area to where we had been dropped off!
The ship was quite dated and shabby even though we had been told that it had been recently refurbished.The shows were ok,nothing special.
Because of the terrible service we asked that our housekeeping charges be taken off our account but this was refused.I could go on and on about all the bad things that happened but I think you get the gist-thank God it was just a weeks cruise!
All in all this was a terrible cruise and I would urge anyone to think twice before booking with Costa.
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| Quality of Food |  |
| Best food was the burger bar.Worst was the lunchtime buffet.Avoid the steak unless you want it cremated or almost raw-they don't do anything in between! | | Entertainment |  |
| Songs from the movies. | | Shore Excursions | |
| Did all destinations cheaper ourselves | | Staff | |
| My cabin steward because he found me a slightly less lumpy pillow,and a bathrobe. | | Children's Facilities | n/a |
| | Onboard Activities | |
| No-one joined in and everything was repeated in 6 languages so it was a bit tiresome. | | Cabins |  |
| Clean,well equipped,lots of storage,huge bathroom with powerful,spacious shower.Need to sort out the aircon though | | Overall Rating | |
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