Queues, queues & more queues.

Cruises: 7+ cruises

Review: 1

Helpful Votes: 49

Review summary

Having cruised on the Azura several times before we were not expecting any surprises. How wrong can you be. The biggest surprise was QUEUEING, MORE QUEUEING & MORE QUEUEING. It started with queueing for the Peninsular restaurant on the first night. There was about 50 people waiting for the doors open @ about 5:55pm. That wasn't TOO bad. The worst was when the queue was around three sides of the Atrium. There was no one night when the queue was less than 50 @ 5:55pm. We tend not to go the "West End Style" shows because there are a much of a muchness having seen most of the shows many times before. However we decided to go the new Stephen Mulhern spectacular magic show. Since it was close to the start of the show we didn't expect there to be many seats left. We weren't disappointed with two seats right in the middle of the lower circle. Why are people so inconsiderate. So we left without fighting our way though. We went back out for the later show about 1/2 an hour before the start & guess what there was approaching 100 people already queueing, so we didn't join the queue. You wouldn't think that there would be many more opportunities for queueing, how wrong we were to think that. Two days after we left St Petersburg P&O decided to have their Russian bazaar & this was another opportunity to queue. The final opportunity for queueing was when we were due to collect the drinks we had purchased onboard. Twenty minutes after P&O opened the doors we were still 20 yards from getting into the room & with only one person seemingly coming out every 2/3 minutes we decided not to queue any longer as we had a pre-booked dinner reservation. I know that these queues are not down to P&O but individuals. Every one we spoke to had never experienced queueing seen on Azura or any other cruise ship. Azura is sadly in need of an overhaul & review of management procedures. Have you ever tried to watch a LEGO movie when the outdoor screen has many large black blocks instead of film details. Many of the staff in the buffet restaurant still wear blinkers when it comes to collecting dirty plates or wiping tables. However staff in the Costa coffee bar seem to have the same DNA as they didn't see us trying to get served by waving our hands as they walked by. We did not see many waiting staff walking too far from the bars to satisfy cruisers thirst. Nor do the staff enforce the sanitation requirements when coming onboard or entering the buffet or asking cruisers to vacate dining tables @ peak times. People were left walking around with trays looking for somewhere to sit when people were sat there on sea days playing cards or reading books because there appears to be insufficient places to sit indoors on inclement days. The cabin steward unfortunately did not meet the previous high standards set by others. In this day & age I find it strange that P&O still insist on hearding people around lovely towns & cities on trips without the means of clearly imparting information. Guides using a radio microphone with all the group having a radio receivers to hear what is being said even when not in close proximity to the Guide is becoming the norm. Despite all the moaning I have done overall we enjoyed the cruise

Embarkation

Ship experiences

Food and Dining

Onboard Activities

Entertainment

Service and Staff

Ship Quality

Cabin / Stateroom

Ports of call

Travemunde (Lubeck), Germany

Helsinki, Finland

St. Petersburg, Russian Federation

Tallinn, Estonia

Stockholm, Sweden

Copenhagen, Denmark

Skagen, Denmark

Disembarkation