My Amazing Azamara Adriatic Journey – Part 1

Last week I had the pleasure and was very fortunate to travel on the Azamara Journey around the Adriatic for 7 nights. For anyone who has not heard of Azamara cruises before they are a subsidiary of Royal Caribbean & Celebrity Cruise lines, but offer a very different type of cruising focusing more on  luxury and destination immersive cruising. The Azamara Journey and Quest (sister ship – identical) vessels are a lot more intimate in size, weighing at 30,000 tonnes and with a maximum occupancy of 686 passengers with 408 crew and staff on board – very good ratio passenger to staff.

Anyway my Azamara Journey started at the port of Venice which is only a 20/30 minute taxi ride from Venice if travelling by car, the check-in at the port was very smooth and hassle free. Once I boarded the ship I was surprised at the number of facilities and amenities on-board for a ship this size, the decor and furnishings were very tasteful with lots of artwork around the ship, very ‘Country Club’ feel about the place. My first port of call was to the bar on the pool deck for a refreshing beer or two (thirsty work travelling!) where I met up with my colleague Robin from work. We then had lunch at the Patio which was the pool grill where there was a  self service salad bar and where you could order your burgers and other meats to your liking, which is then brought to your table by the waiter.

After lunch I made our way to our cabin and thought I would take some decent pictures of this while it’s empty and not cluttered with all clothes everywhere, we were on deck 4 in an outside picture window cabin. The cabin itself was very spacious, tastefully decorated, with a seating area and table a large flat screen TV, with ample draw and wardrobe space plus plenty of hangers, the bathroom was very clean, modern and compact.

– Warning!!! – Outside Obstructed Cabins! See Below – We met a lovely couple by the name of Joseph and Elizabeth (Joe & Liz if your reading this!) who have travelled a few times on Azamara. They had booked a guaranteed outside cabin and they ended up in a obstructed cabin which they were fine with, but it was the size of cabin it was much smaller in size to an outside or inside cabin with no seating or table area to have room service. Luckily they managed to get moved and I would like to thank them personally for not just letting us view their cabin but also for their time and friendship on board.

We then had a look round the other decks taking pictures and videos of the different areas, facilities and amenities on the ship which will be hopefully helpful to my colleagues and customers alike. It was then sail off time from beautiful Venice at around 5 pm passing the fantastic buildings and architecture of St Mark’s Square.

Next stop Hvar, Split and a ‘Azamazing Evening’, plus much more…