Azamara Journey interiors, 17 August 2018

As some of you are perhaps aware, I have been a long-time admirer of the R-Class ships, eight of which were delivered between 1998 and 2001 to the long-defunct Renaissance Cruises. But shockingly, I had never been onboard one until Friday when, thanks to the fine people at the Finnish cruise retailer Risteilykeskus, I had a chance to go onboard the Azamara Journey when she was in Helsinki. So, now I invite all of you to go on a little journey through the Azamara Journey with me, complete with some thoughts on what the ships I have long waited to actually go onboard were actually like.

Azamara Journey

IMO 9200940
Name history: R Six, Blue Dream, Azamara Journey
Built 2000, Chantiers de l'Atlantique St. Nazaire, France
Tonnage 30 277 GT
Length 181,00 m
Width 25,46 m
Draugth 5,80 m
690 passengers (lower berths)
826 passengers (maximum)
4 Wärtsilä diesels, combined 13 500 kW
2 propellers
2 bow thrusters
Speed 18 knots

For a brief history of the ship, feel free to take a look at my earlier entry on it. And now to the tour:

Deck 11 has sun decks forward, around the radar mast. The outer deck areas aft, around the funnel, are not passenger accessible, somewhat to my surprise.

Deck 10 has The Living Room observation lounge and the Card Room forward, followed by open decks, then aft there's The Drawing Room (actually a library) and the two extra-cost dining options, Aqualina and Prime C.

The Living Room has nice forward views thanks to the location.

The decor isn't bad either. I like the fact that Azamara have not been afraid to use some colour, of wood, in their interiors, whereas many lines towards the luxury end tend to go with grey with grey on grey these days.

In the aft bit around the funnel, we first have The Drawing Room, a library with views overlooking the pool.

Which also retains a lot of the Titanic-inspired original decor of the ship (bear in mid that these ships arrived just after James Cameron's film had made the famous ship very hip again).

Touches of the Titanic can also be seen in the stairwells.

Next, we have the italian-style Aqualina speciality restaurant on the port side.

For some reason, the aftmost bit of Aqualina had entirely different kind of seats.

Mirroring Aqualina on the starboard side is the other extra-cost restaurant, Prime C, which served steaks and seafood.

In both restaurants the layout was slightly strange, feeling almost like a corridor with some tables put in. It maximises the outside views, but the overall effect was not as pleasant as it could, and maybe should, have been.

Deck 9 has the very traditional pool deck layout, with the spa and gym forward, followed by the pool and an al fresco restaurant amidships, and the buffet aft around the funnel casing. There is also another open-air bar right aft.

Forward, there is an extra-cost spa terrace...

...followed by The Sanctum Spa. Here is one of the treatment rooms.

If you're showing Finns a cruise ship, you'd better also show them the sauna. And be prepared for complaints if it isn't a proper (i.e. Finnish) one. This one was Turkish. Okay, this is a actually the dressing room, since I figured you're not interested in pictures of mist.

I wouldn't mind having a chance to just lay there on the deck chairs reading a book for a day or two to be honest.

The pool looked mighty inviting, too!

Sheltered sitting area on the port side. The grey is mighty strong with this one!

The Patio outdoors restaurant on the starboard side.

The buffet restaurant Windows Café is next aft. Here, the layout and table placements again gave a bit of a corridor-like feeling to me for some reason.

Aft, accessible only though the buffet, is the Sunset Bar.

Decks 8, 7 and 6 are all given exclusively over to cabins, and as the ship was fully booked we didn't get to see any, alas.

Deck 5 is another public room deck, with the Cabaret Lounge forward, Casino, Spirits sports bar and shops amidships, Mosaic Café at the atrium, and the Discoveries main dining room, with its own aperitive bar, aft.

The Cabaret Lounge is obviously not a full-blown theatre like you find on many larger ships...

...not that this would be nescessarily a bad thing.

More Titanic-esque edwardiana: the access corridor to the Cabaret Lounge.

Spirits sports bar. I didn't photograph the Casino - if you've seen one Las Vegasian cruise ship casino, you've seen all of them (the same also goes for the ones drawing from Monaco).

The Atrium takes the Titanic theme quite far. Mosaic Café in the background.

Discoveries Bar. As the ship operates open seating, this place obviously has the function of giving a nice place to wait for a table to free is you come in on a busy time.

Discoveries restaurant, with the captain's table on the right.

As a wee bit of criticism, I must say that "Discoveries" isn't the most original name for a restaurant. In this bit the decor is also quite boring luxury grey again.

Deck 4 is the lowest passenger-accessible deck, with guest relations, excursions, etc desks grouped around the lower level of the atrium.

The Atrium as seen from the lower level.

From the setting you'd think this is a nice café, but it's actually just the shore excursions desk and some nice seating.

Closing remarks

So, what was the long-awaited first encounter with the R-Class like? In some ways, it was exactly as I expected, especially the Titanic-inspired Edwardian details – though I must say I really like the way they've added contemporary decor around the edwardiana, which makes the ship look like it's doing its own thing, rather than being the pastiche I understand it originally was.

The thing that I didn't expect was how small the ship feels. Sure, it is small by today's cruise ship standards, but in terms of gross tonnage the Azamara Journey is just a tad smaller than, say, Viking Line's Gabriella. Yet the Gabriella, despite carrying four times the number of passengers, doesn't feel as small. The constricted dimentions of the stairwells, the layouts of some of the public spaces etc make the Azamara Journey feel smaller than she is. Maybe this was intended is order to give her a more intimate feel, but I can't help thinking the people who designed the original interior layout should maybe have consulted someone on how to make the spaces feel less constricted.

One thing that I also maybe found slightly disappointing was the nomenclature of the public rooms. A lot of the names came across as being very uninspired and run-of-the-mill: Discoveries, Journey Shop, The Sanctum, The Patio, Windows Café, Prime C... these are not adventurous, expressive names that would fit the destination-intensive product Azamara offers, they are just bland. And while I would like to love The Living Room as a name, Stena Line also use the exact same name for a lounge on their ships, so the association isn't the refined informality Azamara were looking for. Also, calling the library The Drawing Room is nearly as bad as Crystal Cruises calling a café The Bistro.

But the big question of course is, would I sail on the Azamara Journey? Yes. In fact, I'm quite eagerly awaiting the special offer Risteilykeskus promised me on cruises with Azamara...

Azamara Quest in Helsinki, 11 August 2015

Azamara Quest

IMO 9210218
Name history: R Seven, Delphin Renaissance, Blue Moon, Azamara Quest
Built 2000, Chantiers de l'Atlantique St. Nazaire, France
Tonnage 30 277 GT
Length 181,00 m
Width 25,46 m
Draugth 5,80 m
777 passengers (maximum)
4 Wärtsilä diesels, combined 13 500 kW
2 propellers
2 bow thrusters
Speed 18 knots

Finally this blog returns to the scheduled content. And equally finally we feature shots of the current Azamara Club Cruises livery in decent weather; the Azamara Quest was already featured in the current livery once (the entry also includes a history of the ship for those interested), but those shots were taken in pouring rain.

So, the photos below show the Azamara Quest departing from Helsinki Eteläsatama (South Harbour) in the afternoon of 11 August 2015, photographed from Kustaanmiekka. Click on the images to see them in larger size.

Foreground rowan!

A dark hull does make the ship look very good. She's look even better with a dark funnel, though - just take a look at this shot of her sister sailing as the Minerva II.

Posing for cruise ship passage in the foreground.

Azamara Quest passes a teen party.

Next time: As the Silja Serenade is currently in drydock for interior refreshment (and a slight adjustment of her livery), I think it's safe to say she will be the next ship featured. Whether it will be in the form of pictures is her current livery, the upcoming livery or even interiors... well, that remains to be seen.

Azamara Quest in Helsinki, 17 June 2013

Azamara Quest

IMO 9210218
Name history: R Seven, Delphin Renaissance, Blue Moon
Built 2000, Chantiers de l'Atlantique St. Nazaire, France
Tonnage 30 277 GT
Length 181,00 m
Width 25,46 m
Draugth 5,80 m
777 passengers (maximum)
4 Wärtsilä diesels, combined 13 500 kW
2 propellers
2 bow thrusters
Speed 18 knots

Some of you might remember how last year I looked at the liveries of different R-class ships operating for different owners in The R Week. Maybe someone in a decision-making position was reading it, as since then Azamara Club Cruises have alreated their livery to a dark-hulled one that stands out better from the general crowd of white-hulled ships (although they did ignore my main advice about funnel colours). Okay, so maybe they didn't change their livery because I wrote about it. But change their livery they did, which of course gives new, interesting photo opportunities.

The Azamara Quest has been featured in this blog previously as the Blue Moon, but let's look at her history for a bit anyway:

Originally the Azamara Quest was Renaissance Cruises' R Seven, penultimate ship of the R class. When Renaissance Cruises went under in 2001, the R Seven was arrested in Tilbury in September, a month before the rest of the Renaissance fleet was arrested and the company declared bankrupt. In December of the same year the ship was sold to Cruiseinvest Eight and moved to lay-up in Marseilles, alongside her sisters R One, R Two, R Five, R Six and R Eight. The R Seven was reactivated in May 2003 when she was chartered to Germany's Delphin Seereisen as the Delphin Renaissance.

After three years the Delphin Renaissance left the Delphin Seereisen fleet in May 2006 when she was sold to Pullmantur Cruises of Spain. Pullmantur was at the time a notable operator of the R-class ships, having used the R Five/Nautica under the marketing name "Blue Dream" in 2002-2005 and at the time still used the ex-R Six (that had been marketed as the "Blue Star") under the name Blue Dream. The Delphin Renaissance was renamed Blue Moon and repainted in the black-hulled livery used by Pullmantur on their R-class ships (essentially the same livery as the ships had had with Renaissance Cruises), having been white-hulled as the Delphin Renaissance. Interestingly, the rest of the Pullmantur fleet were white-hulled at time.

In 2007 Pullmantur Cruises' new owner Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. transferred the Blue Dream and Blue Moon to the new Azamara Cruises brand (originally they had been slated to transfer to Celebrity Cruises instead). The Blue Dream became the Azamara Journey in May 2007, while the Blue Moon followed six months later as the Azamara Quest. Since then the Azamara Quest has remained in service with Azamara Cruises. The company was rebranded Azamara Club Cruises in 2010. In 2013 the originally white-hulled Azamara ships were repainted with dark hulls, essentially identical to their original Renaissance Cruises livery.

The photographs below show the Azamara Quest departing Helsinki on the afternoon of 17 June 2013. The weather, as you can see, was atrocious. but as this was the Azamara Quest's first visit to Helsinki in the new livery I was there anyway.

At the cruise quay on Katajanokka. It wasn'r raining yet, but the clouds sure are threathening...

Two Helsinki landmarks in the background: Helsinki Cathedral (left) and Uspensky Cathedral (right), lutheran and orthodox respectively.

At Suomenlinna when the ship was departing. By this point the rain was pouring down heavily, as you can see from the full-size image.

More rainy Quest.

Notice the near-horizontal raindrops. Fred. Olsen's Boudicca was also in port on this day, but as the rain showed no sign of abating I decided not to stay out to photograph her.

Next time: Carnival Legend.

Azamara Journey in Helsinki, 15 June 2012

We continue "The R Week" with Azamara Club Cruises' Azamara Journey. Previously featured in this series was the Ocean Princess, to come are (at least) the Nautica and Columbus 2.

Azamara Journey

IMO 9200940
Former names: R Six, Blue Dream
Built 2000, Chantiers de l'Atlantique St. Nazaire, France
Tonnage 30 277 GT
Length 181,00 m
Width 25,46 m
Draugth 5,80 m
826 passengers (maximum)
4 Wärtsilä diesels, combined 13 500 kW
2 propellers
2 bow thrusters
Speed 18 knots

Azamara Journey was originally built as the R Six (as is evident from the name), the sixth ship in Renaissance Cruises' eight-strong R-class. After Renaissance Cruises' brankruptcy in October 2001 the ship, like her sisters, was laid up; first in Gibraltar and then in Marseille. After almost two years of inactivity the ship was chartered in June 2003 to Pullmantur Cruises of Spain, joining her sister R Five. Both R Five and R Six retained their original names but were marketed as the "Blue Dream" and "Blue Star", respectively. In 2005 the R Six was (confusingly) renamed Blue Dream, the R Five "Blue Dream" having passed to Oceania Cruises as the Nautica. (Don't worry, this will get even more confusing...)

Pullmantur Cruises was acquired in 2005 by Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. In 2006 Pullmantur purchased both the Blue Dream and her sister Delphin Renaissance (ex-R Seven), that was now renamed Blue Moon. However, soon after this the decision was made to transfer the Blue Dream and Blue Moon within the Royal Caribbean companies to Celebrity Cruises, to join the Celebrity Xpeditions sub-brand. Presumably the ships would have been renamed Celebrity Journey and Celebrity Quest, but this never came to pass as instead a new separate sub-brand of Celebrity Cruises, Azamara Cruises, was created for the two ships. Perhaps the decision to create a new brand was due to the success of Oceania Cruises, operating three other R-class ships, as many observers noted that early on the Azamara brand was essentially undistinguishable from the Oceania brand.

The Blue Dream left the Pullmantur fleet in May 2007, becoming Azamara Cruises' first ship Azamara Journey, cruising on world-wide itineraries. Six months later she was joined by Blue Moon, now renamed Azamara Quest. In 2010 Azamara Cruises got a new CEO, Larry Pimentel, and subsequently the company was rebranded as Azamara Club Cruises with a new logo and slightly altered livery. Internally the ships were partially refitted and the cruise product was made more distinct from that of Oceania Cruises. (For those interested, you can see the Azamara Journey in the original Azamara livery for instance here).

The photographs below show the Azamara Journey passing through the Kustaanmiekka Strait on 15 June 2012, shortly after departing Helsinki South Harbour. Click on the individual images to view in larger size.

Inbound to Kustaanmiekka on Kruunuvuorenselkä.

Compared to the Ocean Princess, the more colourful funnel symbol is definately an improvement. As is the company logo on the hull and the blue stripe demarking the hull from the superstructure.

I'm also a big, big fan of the black-painted window frames of the bridge, it gives the ship a much more sleek appearance.

Notice that the tenders have little blue stripes on them in the same hue as the stripe on the ship - a very neat little detail.

Outbound. Unfortunately I didn't get too many good photographs from this direction due to the Costa Voyager passing hot on the heels of the Azamara Journey - the Voyager was on her first Helsinki visit and hence naturally got a priority.