NancyB8 Cruise Review on Costa Atlantica on

Review: 1

Helpful Votes: 61

Review summary

This was our 5th cruise but 1st time on Costa. We booked an outside cabin with a Veranda, choosing carefully to avoid one which was obstructed by the lifeboats. We had Cabin #5249 on the I Clowns deck. It was a nice-sized cabin with a Queen size bed, sofa, lots of storage space and a small veranda with two chairs. All our suitcases fit under the bed which helped with storage. The bathroom was a reasonable size with lots of shelves and a good size shower with wonderful water pressure. We thought the ship was absolutely spectacular! The Costa Atlantica had many well-designed public rooms and each seemed perfect for its purpose. I noticed that the sound-proofing was very well done because as we walked from one room featuring classical music, and walked into the next room with popular music playing, you could not hear what was going on in the next room. The Atrium lobby is just beautiful and features a piano bar in the center. Cafe Florian, which is an exact replica of a cafe in Venice dating back to the 1700's, was beautiful and quite unique as far as the usual cruise ship public rooms go. It featured classical music from Viennese Waltzes to Opera each night. The Madame Butterfly Lounge was also quite beautiful. Each stairwell features Murano glass vases in a display area and there is a separate brochure which details all the artwork on the ship. Entertainment was somewhat weak except for Richard Ianni and the Everything Italian production show. Don't miss the Toga Night show on the final evening. It was WONDERFUL!! And it was so much fun to see the majority of the people dressed in togas at dinner and at the show. Contrary to other postings we found the food in the dining room AND buffet to be quite good, including the desserts. We also had very good service in the dining room. There have been negative comments on various cruise boards about the passengers on the Costa ships which in the Caribbean are about 75% American and 25% European. (In the Med, the percentages tend to be reversed.) Some people have complained that the European passengers are rude. We did not find that to be the case at all. In fact, we witnessed more rude behavior from our fellow Americans! Yes, some announcements are made in 5 different languages. The only time that was irritating was during the fire drills when we were already restless after having been lined up in our life vests for over a half hour and then had to endure the entire drill given in 5 languages ? however, we can all appreciate the importance of the information. We skipped Bingo since that also were delivered in 5 languages. I overheard some Americans complaining that they encountered other passengers ?who could only speak a few sentences in broken English?. I found that quite ironice through, since most Americans can?t even speak ONE WORD in another language, so what is the complaint?! The assistant cruise director went from English, to Italian, to French, to German, and to Spanish without blinking an eyelash and sounding superbly fluent in each language. I was also very impressed with the command of English of several of the European passengers. We felt the mix of passengers added a certain exotic flair to our cruise.We loved the beauty of the Costa Atlantica, her art and variety of music. Toga night was an absolute standout with Italian Night coming in a close second. On Italian Night in the Tiziano dining room, Italian music starts to play and the waiters and their assistants dance around the room with the lady passengers. Then a conga line forms and everyone dances around the room. Later, there are booths offering games, face painting and bocce ball. On the last night, the usual parade of Baked Alaskas took place and everyone agreed that it was the best Baked Alaska that they had ever tasted on a cruise ship.