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Orient Lines

MV Marco Polo

Your Rating:
Reviewed by:Peter Hazel
# previous cruises: 10+
Date of Trip: March 23, 2000
Itinerary: Singapore to Piraeus

Currently our favorite ship, and this time being from Singapore to Piraeus, we were able to fill in a gap of places we had not been before. This was the last trip for the MP on this route as the Crown Odyssey will be doing it going Eastbound in future, in fact quite a few of the crew were leaving to join the CO. It was nice to see that she was being kept up to her usual standards in spite of that, and the food and service were very good as expected.

The MP is a "ship" not a glitzy floating Hyatt, the decks have a camber even. No big atriums or pizza parlours or golf courses, so the lounges are comfortable and are not really crowded even when the ship is full. The casino is small but seems adequate for the type of passenger. On deck there always seemed to be plenty of deck chairs available...they put a notice in the paper every day that anything left on the chairs for more than 20 minutes can be found at the Purser's office...good idea.

The food and service was still the very good standard we have come to expect on this ship. A happy crew makes a lot of difference and it reflects on the way they do there jobs. There is still quite a few there from the old days on the Ocean Pearl. With a full load the Lido tends to get very busy at lunch but timing can take care of that.

As can usually be found with older ships the cabins vary quite a bit in size and layout. We have found a cabin in the E cat. that we like and have had it for 3 trips now and next time too. A reason for booking early especially on this ship. There was plenty of drawer and closet space for us for a month, but then we go with one suitcase each.

The MP does not go in for the big fancy shows, but there is the usual range of bingo etc. Outside of Europe they have excellent guest lecturers on board so there are plenty of talks about where the ship is going.

Too many ports to list but Orient did it's normal good job on the tours. One thing they do which is good is that the have a day in Suez whilst everyone goes to Cairo, then the next day is the Canal transit. Many ships do the same thing on one day. The overnight trip to Luxor and the Valley of the Kings was included so everyone went. There was also a trip to Agra available from Bombay which many people did.

This is an older experienced traveller type of passenger, except for a quite a big group of neophytes - they were still wearing their name badges when they left the ship. Most of them were repeaters, one was doing his 71st on the MP, so you don't get a lot of complaining. Only one little girl this time, although I'd expect you'd find a lot more on the short Med trips.