More champagne-why not? A trip report for the Regent navigator.
 

So I just returned from a short 5 day cruise aboard the Regent Navigator that I won in a promotion from my grocery store. We had a well appointed cabin with a balcony on deck 6 more towards the front of our ship, upon boarding we were greeted with a glass of champagne and there was a welcome party on the pool deck.Our steward Victor was very polite, left our rooms meticulously spotless and took care of all of our requests with a smile on his face.

Ports
Key West- before heading out on our sea kayak tour in the morning we enjoyed room service breakfast in our cabin. The tour began with a catamaran ride out to a set of mangrove islands where we picked up our 2 person kayaks. We wandered around the mangroves going through little inlets, we saw plenty of birds, a few rays and a nurse shark. Afterward we grabbed some lunch at Catherine's on Duval street, went to Hemingway's house to see the 6- toed kitties, and explored the neighborhoods making sure to avoid the springbreakers on Duval street in the evening.

Grand Cayman-the water was a little cold for us to do any swimming/snorkeling so we took a bus to Royal Palms, chilled at the beach a little and walked back to Georgetown. The walk is not bad if you are in decent shape but West Bay is quite a busy road. There is only so much rum cake you can sample and highend jewelry to look at so we headed back to the ship a little early and lounged by the pool. The beach was pretty here but there are other Caribbean islands that I greatly prefer to GC.

As far as the ship goes I will list the pros and cons, being that this trip was free(aside from the $50 we "donated" to the casino) I really had nothing to complain about but others may find the info useful.

Pro
cabins-spacious with a nice sized balcony and a comfortable bed, I also enjoyed having a nice sized soaking tub. There was a bottle of chilled champagne when we first got to our room and we were able to order 2 bottles of alcohol/liquor for our room which we took home as we could get whatever we wanted throughout the ship

service- the answer is never no and your glass is always full, this is the main reason to choose Regent if you are considering a luxury cruise line.

food- we enjoyed the breakfast buffet and greatly preferred the Compass Rose to Portofino's for dinner. Not that Portofino's was bad, we just enjoyed the food and ambiance much more at CR. I had ordered several items from the healthy selections as well as one of the sugar free desserts as their descriptions appealed to me and everything tasted as great as their full fat counterparts.

Sauna- I used the sauna twice and each time I had it to myself, it felt like my own personal little luxury.

Cons
We had rough seas one day and being a smaller ship you could definitely feel it a lot more, we also noted the well documented vibration towards the back end of the ship and were grateful our cabin was more forward.

This is my own personal pet peeve but the king size beds are actually 2 double beds pushed together.While the beds were extremely comfortable for sleeping this made it difficult to snuggle with your significant other.



We had never been on a pleasure cruise before (though we had both been stationed on aircraft carrier and thus have spent plenty of time at sea), generally we like the freedom of being able to explore the area we are in without any time restraints.In general we thoroughly enjoyed this cruise but will continue to primarily take land based vacations.

Thanks for the post. Regent has a good reputation, but we always felt we wouldn't consume enough alcohol to warrant the higher fare than other cruise lines. Admit we may try it for Tahiti though some day.

Just keep in mind that Regent will only be managing the Paul Gauguin in Tahiti through 2009. After that time,PG Cruises will take over (see pgcruises.com). Hopefully, things will basically stay the same, but that remains to be seen. We've spent 24 nights on the PG and love French Polynesia. We hope to return some day.

Thanks Dreps - I didn't realize that about the PG.

Thanks for the review of the Navigator. Pardon the pun, but I am really lost at sea. I am trying to book a family cruise to Alaska for June 2010 and Regent seems to be the only one that has a cruise leaving on an acceptable date. Although I like good food and wine, I am having trouble justifying the cost differential with other cruise lines. Plus I am going with my kids who will be 20, 18 and 15 - all good travelers and good kids. Does anyone have a suggestion? Is Regent worth the extra cost or should I explore Princess or Holland America?

Many thanks for the help.

Regent has some extremely attractive rates right now for Alaska because of the economy. For example, if booked by May 31, 2009, there is an extra $1000 off per person on your cruise in June 2010. While this will still be more than many other cruise lines, it includes UNLIMITED FREE SHORE EXCURSIONS, and Alaska has some of the most expensive shore excursions anywhere. And, of course, everything is included--all drinks, gratuities, etc. We did Regent several years ago in Alaska, and it was wonderful. Though there are normally not a lot of kids on Regent cruises, the exception seems to be Alaska, and most people say they have a great program, and the kids really enjoy it. Furthermore, if for some reason the fares are reduced further, Regent is very good at passing those reductions along. (Our upcoming Baltics cruise was reduced $2200 per person!) I would also suggest dealing with a TA that specializes in Regent, such as ours: Linda at brownandkeenetravel.com. If you'd like more info, on what we did, including an independent pre-cruise in Denali, feel free to drop me a line: [email protected].

to snk.... I think you really need to look at price. We as a couple would book Regent. As parents and grandparents taking our family on a cruise it would be NCL, maybe Princess or HAL. We would not spend the bucks to take our family on Regent. Call us cheap, but I think that young people would not be impressed by the elegance of Regent. They would be bored.