The Pros and Cons of Sailing on Oceania’s Smallest R-Class Ships

Introduction:  Our Panama Canal Cruise on Oceania Sirena

How to Save Money on an Oceania Cruises Sailing

Oceania Cruises Fleet Explained

Delta First Class Review Atlanta (ATL) to Panama City (PTY)

Westin Playa Bonita Panama Pre-Cruise Hotel Review

Panama Canal Marriott Bonvoy Hotel Options Ranked

Panama Canal New Cruise Terminal Still a Work in Progress

Boarding a Cruise Ship During a Norovirus Outbreak

Oceania Cruises Sirena Vista Suite 6003 Review

What Does Oceania Cruises’ Country Club Casual Dress Code Really Mean?

Oceania Cruises Wine and Spirits Tasting Experiences

What to Expect on a Panama Canal Full Transit

Oceania Cruises Sirena Dining Review

Great Stirrup Cay, Oceania Cruises Private Island???

What Happens When Oceania Cruises Skips a Port Due to Weather?

The Pros and Cons of Sailing on Oceania’s Smallest R-Class Ships

Size Matters, Why We Prefer Oceania Cruises Larger Ships

Introduction

We have been fortunate to have sailed on five of Oceania Cruises eight (soon to be nine) ships.  This includes the new Allura-Class ship Vista, Marina and Riviera, both of purpose-built O-Class ships, as well as two of the R-Class ships – Insignia and Sirena which came from the defunct Renaissance Cruises.  We have previously covered the major differences between the ships in our Oceania Cruises Fleet Explained post earlier in this series.  In this post we really wanted to focus on the pros and cons of sailing on Oceania’s smallest R-Class ships and then end this series with our final thoughts on why size matters among the Oceania Cruises ships.  We know that we risk offending some of the Oceania Cruises loyalists who only have eyes for the small R-Class ships, so we’ll try to explain our reasoning so you can decide for yourself what’s most important to you.

About Us (Again)

Because age, lifestyle, hobbies, travel history, and more all factor into what passengers prefer, we’ll take a minute to describe ourselves.  Feel free to skip this section if you already know or simply don’t care.

We are a married couple in our mid-40s with no children who have visited 50 countries and counting.  We both have extremely demanding careers back home that involve a fair amount of business travel.  We are fortunate to be in a position where our vacation fund has more money, POINTS and MILES in it than the time to use it all each year.  I am a points enthusiast, so we almost never pays cash for a flight or a hotel on vacation freeing up more money for cruising, dining, and exploring.

We value a relaxing atmosphere, generous space, excellent food, interesting fellow passengers, lots of cultural activities, and above all visiting new and interesting places.  What we’re not looking for is “forced fun,” lots of families with small children, major party vibes, and least of all crowds.

Pros of the Smaller R-Class Ships

• Fewer Passengers, the R-Class ships have a capacity of 670 passengers based on double-occupancy.  This compares to 1,250 on O-Class ships and 1,200 on A-Class ships.
• Smaller Ships have certain inherent advantages.  At 594 feet long and just over 30,000 tons these ships are TINY compared to most new ships.  Here are a few things that we like better on these smaller ships:
  • Ability to visit smaller ports with less infrastructure
  • Ability to visit less frequented places as they don’t have to convince that many people to go
  • Ability to do longer and one-off itineraries (though this is also a Con for us as we’ll explain later)
  • Embarkation/Disembarkation/Ports are all a breeze with lines only on the rarest of occasions
  • Tender operations relatively simple
  • Getting to know the crew.  With 400 crew versus 800 on the larger ships you’ll see the same faces much more frequently
  • Getting to know your fellow passengers, particularly like minded passengers.  If you’re extremely active, a night owl, a work out hero, etc. you’re likely to see the same people enjoying the same activities on board and often ending up in the same excursion groupings.
  • Everything is closer on a smaller ship.  This means less time walking down never ending corridors or waiting for elevators when you can just go up or down a flight or two of stairs and more time doing what you want to do.  This is also a major selling point for cruisers with mobility concerns.
• More meals in the Grand Dining Room (MDR).  On many lines this isn’t necessarily a great thing but on Oceania we find the Grand Dining Room to be consistently excellent and on the smaller ships you’re more likely to be seated in the same section with the same wait staff enough to get to know them even on relatively short sailings.  On the larger ships with two more specialty dining restaurants that’s two fewer dinners in the Grand Dining Room which we find makes a difference along with the much larger size space with many more servers, sommeliers, etc.

Cons of the Smaller Ships

• Bathrooms, seriously, bathrooms.  On the R-Class ships bathrooms in anything but the Vista or Owners’ Suites are tiny with low ceilings.  I’m 6″3″ and have to duck to take showers in the Penthouse Suite bathroom or risk another gash to my face from the shower head.
• Specialty Dining.  With just two specialty restaurants rather than the four you’ll find on the larger ships you don’t get as much variety, including access to the popular Red Ginger on the R-Class ships with the exception of Sirena.
• Onboard entertainment isn’t the strongest feature of Oceania Cruises to begin with, but on the smaller ships there’s generally less variety and a smaller team of performers.
• The onboard “vibe.”  With such a small number of crew and passengers good and BAD vibes can spread fast.  We found on our Insignia cruise that both our fellow passengers and crew were all extremely happy to be there.  On our most recent Sirena cruise I’m sorry to say that wasn’t true of the crew (dealing with a Norovirus outbreak on the previous sailing) or our fellow passengers (cancelled port, rough seas, reduced service due to aforementioned Norovirus).  The vibe on our sailing improved as the cruise went on and things began to return to normal, but it wasn’t as joyful as we’re used to on board an Oceania Cruises sailing.
• Fewer onboard enrichment activities available.  With no Culinary Center, Artist Loft, or La Reserve there’s less to do on board.  During a port-intensive itinerary you may not notice; however, if you have several back-to-back days at sea you may crave a bit more to do.
• Mechanical issues can happen on any ship; however, the R-Class ships are more prone to issues due to their age.  For example, Oceania Insignia suffered an engine room fire more than 10 years ago when sadly three members of the crew lost their lives. This wasn’t long before our first Oceania Cruises sailing aboard Insignia and I have to admit it caused us to have a few second thoughts on our sailing from Reykjavik to Copenhagen with long stretches of open water in the North Atlantic.

I need to preface this last one is 100% a function of our work schedules.  With these smaller ships many of the itineraries stretch to 20 days or more sailing through fascinating parts of the world.  Unfortunately we simply can’t take cruises this long at this point in our lives, so we are starting to feel that we’re “running out” of Oceania Cruises itineraries in the 7-12 day range that work for us without repeating prior sailings.

Final Approach

Our first consideration when booking any cruise is the itinerary as we’re most focused on the ports so we consider the ship later in the decision making process.  We’ve had amazing trips on Oceania Cruises’ larger AND smaller ships and find them both great ships that provide amazing cruises.  We always encourage new Oceania cruisers to try shorter sailings on both R and O/A ships prior to making a decision on which one they prefer as the experiences while similar do have some notable differences so you can figure out the Pros and Cons of sailing on Oceania’s smallest R-Class ships for yourself.