A Quick Look Around

The Star Pride at the Akureyri dock

General

Our last several cruises have been on Seabourn and Celebrity and, although the Star Pride might not be as physically “luxurious” as those ships, we were glad to be back on Windstar. The atmosphere and “feeling” on Windstar ships seems to be more social and friendly. As a roughly 300 passenger ship, the Star Pride is certainly not a large ship, but it has all the features and facilities that we needed while still having a very friendly environment.

Statistics

The Star Pride has a passenger capacity of 312 people, so it is a relatively small ship at 522 feet long. The normal crew complement is 190 people so there is more one crew member for every 1.64 passengers: a very nice ratio. Although it looks like a rather good-sized ship, we did find out that, when it comes to handling rough seas, size does matter. More about that in the daily log.

The Star Pride actually has a bit of a connection to our last cruise on Seabourn. The Start Pride and her two sister ships, the Star Breeze and Star Legend, used to be Seabourn ships but were sold to Windstar when Seabourn started moving to larger ships. When the ships came over from Seabourn, they were 212 passenger ships but soon after coming to Windstar, they were chopped in half, a section with another 50 cabins added, then put back together. At the same time there was a general updating and renovation, including new, more efficient, engines, and a few new facilities added, like the new specialty restaurant, Cuadro 44.

Our cabin

Our cabin on the Star Pride

Our cabin was comfortable with good storage space. We did not have a balcony/veranda as they were all taken by the time we were making arrangements but, looking back, I doubt that we would have made much use of one if we had it. Rather than a balcony we just had large windows, but we also got a larger interior space, as balconies are carved out of the same total cabin area. We were in cabin 504 on deck 5 which was generally very convenient to most of the ship activities and dining, but since we were at the very forward end of the ship, we had a bit of a walk to get to the central areas. Perhaps as a result of its Seabourn history, this cabin was exactly the same size as our cabin on the Seabourn Encore, 277 square feet.

A long walk to/from our cabin

The cabin was a little short on 110V electrical outlets (I only found one) or USB plugs to use (none). I had come prepared with the appropriate adapter plugs and USB adapters so it was not a significant problem.

The pool deck and open area was very lightly used

Food/Dining

There are two primary restaurants and two specialty restaurants on the Star Pride and her sister ships.

Amphora is the main evening dining room and is only open for dinner and a few special functions, like wine tastings.

Amphora is ready for the dinner crowd.

This is the “fine dining” restaurant on the Star Pride and the atmosphere is certainly very nice, but not “stuffy”. There are some simple attire guidelines (no jeans, no flip-flops or sneakers, and no t-shirts) but there are no “Formal” evenings and the term “casual elegance” seems appropriate. We were very impressed by the quality of the food, at least for our tastes. I thought the food to be a notch or two above what we had on the Seabourn Encore and at least equal to the food in the Luminae restaurant on the Celebrity Beyond.

The primary (only?) restaurant open for breakfast and lunch is the Veranda. On our other Windstar cruises, the Veranda has been a combination of interior seating and open air. Given the weather on this cruise, all seating was interior and it did sometimes feel a little tight.

The Veranda restaurant at lunch

The Veranda was primarily buffet style, with multiple self-serve stations and many choices, and there were menus available from which you could order cooked-to-order table service items. The food on the buffets looks so good we seldom bothered to order from the menu. In the evening, part of the Veranda converts to the “Candles” specialty evening restaurant. Again, on other Windstar cruises, Candles has primarily been an open-air “al fresco” experience but that was not possible on this cruise. While the service in Candles was a notch more attentive than in Amphora, I did not think the food significantly better. Not being able to have the al fresco experience drops the pleasure factor a little.

The “new” restaurant that was added in the renovation and enlargement process was “Cuadro 44”. This is a relatively small space that I believe shares the kitchen with Candles.

We are the first arrivals this evening in Cuadro 44

Cuadro 44 seems to have a somewhat Spanish focus, but not overwhelmingly so. Some of the dishes had a Spanish leaning, but I was disappointed in that there was only one Spanish wine offered. The menu here did differ significantly from what was offered in Amphora, was generally well executed, and the service was excellent.

Lounges & Entertainment

Close to the bow of the ship is a quiet area “lounge” with a “coffee shop” type of atmosphere, complete with a coffee bar and selection of small “finger foods”. This was a good place to sit and read and watch the world go by while at sea. Since the outside deck areas were essentially uninhabitable, this area was very popular.

The Forward Lounge offered a quiet and comfortable area.

There was also a bar and large area on the open deck which would normally see a lot of activity, but I don’t think I ever saw anyone (other than the crew) in this area. One day we took a little walk around the deck a few times with the wind blowing 30 mph, the temperature about 45F, and we noticed the crew were reloading the self-serve ice cream machine. I couldn’t help but think, “Why?!”.

The main lounge was a theater seating type facility with a stage that was designed for lectures, music, and presentations. Kuba (officer in charge of excursions) gave the port talks here, a husband-and-wife photography team gave their lectures here, and receptions and meetings were held here. It was pressed into service for a couple of functions that would normally be held on the open deck but could not because of the weather. It was less than ideal for this because there was limited standing room so it was difficult to “mix” in this space.

Captain Rowden and many of the crew saying good-by the last night

The Compass Rose was the primary entertainment facility where the four person band and a two person duo alternated in providing the entertainment. For just a quick example of some of the music, here is a video montage combining several performances of the regular entertainers, plus a “guest appearance” of Kuba on the harmonica. The Compass Rose had complete bar service and a decent dance floor so we ended up here most evenings after dinner. Sitting back while listening to “our kind of music” and nursing a glass (or two) of cognac is a good way to spend a couple of hours.

Excursions

We had signed up for excursions, pretty well one every day of the cruise, prior to the start of the cruise. Of course, with the new itinerary all those went out the window. The list of available excursions was a moving target, changing daily as we changed our schedule. The excursion office (consisting of Kuba and two others) did a good job of keeping up with the changes but some things were just beyond them. We ended up not being at any of the ports on the originally planned day (except for the end of the cruise in Reykjavik) and, at some of the ports, there were other ships there who were on their schedule, so they had first priority on any excursions and we had the leftovers. Because of this, on one of the days there were no excursions available until 2:15 PM and then there was only one choice.

Other

We checked out the exercise room and it looked reasonable for a ship of this size. However, as I discovered in the past, trying to exercise on a “rocking and rolling” ship is not a good thing, and the Star Pride was almost always on the move. There was, of course, the usual boutique and store, but it cannot be open for business when the ship is in port, so it was seldom open.

On all of our previous Windstar cruises, there has been a daily printed program giving information about the port, the ship’s schedule for the day, and any available excursions. With our very “dynamic” schedule on this cruise, I don’t think there was any way the crew could reasonably produce a printed schedule. By the time they had it written and printed, our schedule would have changed.

Unlike our last several cruises where we essentially never saw the captain or other senior officers, Captain Rowdan and his officers were all over the ship, constantly interacting with the passengers. Interestingly, Captain Rowdan said that he had served as captain on a very large cruise ship for the past 12 years before coming to Windstar about 7 weeks ago. The interesting thing is that he really seemed to be enjoying the cruise, even with all the problems and challenges. At one point he said that Windstar, with the small ships, friendly, fun, and social attitude among the crew and guests, was the “best kept secret in the cruise industry”. He got a big round of applause from that comment.

End of Chapter 0: The Star Pride

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