Worst Luxury Cruise We have Sailed

Seven Seas Explorer Cruise Review to Other (Asia/Africa/Middle East)

Cruises: 4-6 cruises
Review: 1
Helpful Votes: 32

Overall rating:

2 out of 5
Verified Review
Seven Seas Explorer

17 Night Coastal Beauties Of The Pacific (Singapore To Sydney)

Sail date: December 12, 2022

Ship: Seven Seas Explorer

Cabin type: Suite

Cabin number: 916

Traveled as: Large Group

Reviewed: 1 year ago

Review summary

Regent Seven Seas-Explorer Cruise Review December 2022 Luxury Cruise Rating Poor 1. Embarkation: Very Poor. Rating 1. a. Long Que to Board with no sense of organization or boarding by reserved times or suite category. b. Some Rooms very unclean upon entry. 2. Cabin Suite Condition: Poor. Rating 2 a. For a relatively New Luxury Ship, Suites in very poor condition. b. Suite Bathroom had black mold in shower. c. We found a used catheter in our room upon arrival, unsanitary as a Handicap Room. d. Ridiculously small closet for this size penthouse suite, some clothes had to be hung in the bathroom. e. Poor condition of walls, floors, furniture, etc. Many scrapes, nicks, etc. Needs updating. 3. WIFI-Communication: Very Poor. Rating 0 a. We rate this a zero because WIFI mostly was non-existent for the entire voyage unless you left the ship! b. Crew offered so many excuses, but the fact is there were complete days without any ability to communicate except from the business center and another long que. c. WIFI was included but did not work, so its obvious why it was included in the fare. 4. Ports of Call: Poor. Rating 2 a. Docked at poor condition and/or industrial ports. Was this to save Regent money on port fees? b. Two Ports of call Cancelled adding 3 extra days at sea, result was more days at sea than in port on 17 day cruise. This should have been a repositioning cruise and a fare that reflected such. c. Mass confusion at each port with customs and what documents were needed to leave the ship. d. Long ques and confusion on excursion buses to board. Extra step to meet in the theatre and then receive a bus number to disembark rather than simply number your excursion ticket matched to a bus in advance. Very dis-organized every day. 5. Excursions: Very Poor. Rating 1 a. Very Poor Quality of excursions offered whether included in cruise fare or extra charge. b. Many excursions cancelled without room to rebook new ones c. Many excursions were a 5+ Hour Bus Ride to a ½ hour to 1 hour site visit. d. Very Poor Organization without many options to choose from. e. Excursion Real Time Reviews were not offered onboard as with Seabourn or Viking. 6. Entertainment: Good. Rating 8 a. Good overall quality of entertainment and the best of any small-medium ship we have sailed. 7. Explorer Ship Quality: Poor. Rating 2 a. Very Poor Quality overall for a six year old ship billed as the “Most Expensive Ship Ever Built” b. All online videos are of when the ship was new. Very poorly maintained ship c. Public Spaces like lobby and atrium still in decent shape the rest needs a re-fit d. Pool Deck needs a good cleaning and some maintenance. e. Casino was very dated with old machines and strange open/close hours. Staffing Problem? 8. Dining: Good. Rating 6 a. Specialty restaurants were overall fair to good depending upon your order. b. Room Service consistently served cool to cold food that should have been hot. 9. Crew Staff: Fair. Rating 5 a. Mostly helpful but seemed like they really did not want to help you if you had an issue b. Argued with you if you challenged their opinion on an issue c. WAY LESS STAFF To Guest Ratio than advertised. The staff to guest ratio was very low and not like the staff to guest ration of Seabourn or Viking. d. CEO and Board of director for Regent Seven Seas was fired when we embarked from Singapore and may have had an affect on the staff morale and quality of service we received on the cruise. e. Staff used Covid for selective excuses when convenient, all passengers were vaccinated and boosted prior to boarding. No active cases of Covid on-board. We were denied a guided ship tour and art tours for this reason. Made no sense as all passengers were allowed in these public spaces every day. 10. Cabin Butler: Excellent. Rating 9 a. Binay- our butler when above and beyond to help us have a Xmas Eve Cocktail party. Again we wanted to review Binay to regent online and were unable to do so because of the lack of internet service. We did not receive any hard copy review materials at the end of the cruise. b. Cabin Cleaning Steward was also very good to excellent. c. We attempted to review them online but unfortunately the WIFI was poor or non-existent to do so. 11. Disembarkation: Very Poor. Rating 1 a. Again very disorganized! You picked a time to disembark from a list the staff provided. We picked 8:45 yet at 8 am, they were asking ALL passengers to vacate the ship. b. From our Cabin to the Dock, maybe 50 yards, staff destroyed a piece of our brand new luggage. We filed a report but based upon this experience we doubt we will receive compensation. 12. Passenger Comments: Very Poor. Rating 1 a. We have never experienced a luxury cruise with this many dissatisfied onboard passengers. Many were beside themselves livid at the level of broken promises by Regent and poor service for a luxury line. b. Past passengers that sailed on this ship told us it was in poor quality and service substandard. c. Regent Pre Cruise Hotel in Singapore, Fairmont was a total disaster and very poor quality accommodations and food according to numerous passengers. Glad we did not take this option again! d. All the You Tube videos on this ship and luxury cruise line should be taken down or commented upon as to their inaccuracy. Luxury Only Cruises booking should take note of our reviews and not book future passengers on this ship or Regent Seven Seas until significant changes are made that you can verify. Our group of eight, McBroom-Cabin 916, Kosanovich-Cabin 725, Carwile-Cabin 828, Sukaly- Cabin 873 would like a reimbursement or compensation for a luxury cruise that was significantly substandard in quality from what we have experienced in the past voyages booked through you with Seaborn and Viking. All of us believe that we did not receive what we were promised and contracted by Regent. If we had some easy way to file litigation against Regent, and have a high success rate, we would embark on that path to recover some of the significant fares we paid for a very poor experience. We are all very disappointed in a very expensive trip and would like to attempt to recover some of the costs. We do NOT want a future cruise credit or anything of the sort from Regent, but will accept a refund of some type. We also would accept an additional credit from Luxury Only Cruises for a future luxury cruise booking with you. Any offer to help recover some of the fare costs would be appreciated. We also ask that you forward a copy of this review to Regent Cruise lines in Miami, Fl. relating our deep dissatisfaction with their cruise line and service.

Embarkation

1 out of 5
Disorganised with long wait time and lines and did not board by Suite Catagory

Ship experiences

Food and Dining

3 out of 5
Specialty Restaurants were good depending upon what you ordered

Onboard Activities

1 out of 5

Entertainment

4 out of 5

Service and Staff

2 out of 5
Only 1 staff member Binay our Butler was amazing and excellent 5 Stars! Deserves a raise.

Ship Quality

1 out of 5
For a 5 year old ship it is in poor condition for "The Most Expensive Cruise Ship Ever Built"

Cabin / Stateroom

1 out of 5
Very beat up cabin in need of TLC. Bathroom had black mold in the shower. Bangs and nicks everywhere. Found a used catheter under the couch in the main room... Yuck!

Ship tip

Don't Sail. Pick Seaborn or Viking

Ports of call

Semarang, Java, Indonesia

1 out of 5
Dirty 3rd world

Benoa, Bali, Indonesia

1 out of 5

Darwin, Australia

4 out of 5

Thursday Island, Australia Did not visit port

Cairns, Australia

4 out of 5
Barrier Reef was excellent

Whitsunday Islands, Australia

1 out of 5
Highly Damaged Reef from Cyclone in 2017

Brisbane, Australia Did not visit port

Disembarkation

1 out of 5
Totally disorganized and the crew broke a piece of my brand new luggage delivering it to the dock from our suite!
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4 Comments

PaulzyJC    1 year ago

["c. Mass confusion at each port with customs and what documents were needed to leave the ship."]. Something like this would certainly be something that Cruisers would already know.

Gwbigdog    1 year ago

Oops sorry 😞 thanks

ccgal6    1 year ago

Ever since NCL took over they went down hill. Certainly wasn't like this 20+ years ago.

banaford    1 year ago

Regent Luxury Cruise, Regent, will never see this review. They do not monitor this site. However, if you were just reviewing for other cruisers, thank you for your detailed review.