Friendly staff on deck. Food very plain, treated like cattle on last day! Had to leave cabin at 0830 while cleaners waited outside from 0700! Very expensive for what it was. Will not recommend Ocean Village to my friends.

I fell the traditional cruising experience has been lost on the Ocean Village ship.

The personal touch has been lost.
I will not be reccomending this cruise to anyone.

We went with OV2 last November 2007, with one week prior to the cruise at the Accra Beach hotel in Barbados, that was fabulous, couldn't fault the hotel or Barbados.
We were then looking forward to the cruise, 'sugar and spice', well it was absolutely awful. If you like queuing this is the place to be, you have to queue for everything, the lifts, food, shops, getting on and off the ship, queuing everywhere.
The entertainment for children was almost non-existent, a swimming pool slightly larger than a paddling pool that smelt of pee, my son went in once and refused to enter again. I complained about the lack of facilities for children, considering that the cruise states there is plenty for them to do, I was told that there were only 50+ kids on board and if we had come the following week there would be 350+ kids on board and there would be more entertainment planned then. Hence the reason there are lots of children running around - nothing for them to do!
Due to the lack of facilities you are forced to take tours every day and that is very expensive, during our week in Barbados, we were taking trips and tours and on average I'd say the tours that you purchase onboard are up to three times more expensive.
The food and buffet service was unbelievably bad, fighting to get a table, the only food that was edible was the salad and fruits, impossible to get a drink while eating, not enough staff around and when it was really busy they totally disappeared. Ice cream and soft drinks are extra, my 12 year old managed with his room key to clock up £74 on them in one week. My husbands bar bill was considerably larger than that, but we won't go into that!
The sun deck is very small and we had a very bad experience with group of people, who after we had got two sun loungers and had been there for nearly two hours came up and demanded that they were theirs, no towels on them when we had arrived. They were very abusive all six of them, my Husband who has been at sea most of his life, knew to get the purser, and he left me alone for a short time with these awful people, and they reduced me to tears.
If you are traveling with children expect to stay in your cabin at nights because you will not be allowed them in the entertainment areas and since there is nothing else to do except watch the two films repeated daily or the news channel at night it will be very boring in the evening. If you buy duty free cigarettes or alcohol in any of the ports they are confiscated when you return to the ship and will be returned when you leave, considering that the drinks charges on the ship are what you would expect to pay in the pub back home. There are no stops on any of the islands where you can go ashore at night, you have to return by 5.30. Which is a pity because as a bad sleeper and sitting out on deck most nights I couldn't help but notice that we were sailing in circles most nights.
The ship itself is a bit tatty, refitted they say, tarted up I say. It can be a bit smelly, hideous yellow and orange everywhere, we had only two nights when the bathroom facilities not not work, but there is no drinking water in the cabin's and you have to pay well over the odds for bottle water. The room was kept very clean by an excellent cleaner, who was really lovely and couldn't do enough for us, he was the only one we left a tip for.
To summarise it is a extremely cheap and very nasty holiday. I would never ever return to Ocean Village again. This cruise has a lot of beer bellys, tattoos and generally unsavoury types. All the people who were at our hotel in Barbados and went onto Ocean Village 2 said exactly the same.

Be warned: it feels like they are only after your money. If it doesn't pay for them, they wont do it. Everything on board is twice as expensive as it should be. While the front line staff is very friendly and helpful, management is pushing them hard. If you want to be treated as an individual (and not just as potential revenue), go elsewhere.

Would not recommend if your looking for a touch of luxury.

The entertainment is very poor (although it does have its high spots - the theatre lighting was great as was the lead female singer in the theatre group) and suffers from mixing the role of retail and events director. The entertainment seems to be run by amateurs rather than slick professionals. It seems as though they would like to turn all the public spaces into market stalls. The same show and comedian were on this cruise as were on two and a half years ago. The focal point of the entertainment has been configured as a small bar which cannot hold many people and sight lines are very poor. There is also a dull smokey bar called the Oval.

The food is OK but becomes very monotonous and is far removed from the simple but fresh food available on shore.

The Thomas Cook flights were very bad with no leg room and the need to sell soft drinks and tea/coffee before serving a meal. The meal came in a cardboard box delightfully decorated with words related to exotic foods yet inside was dried up roast beef, yorkshire pudding and carrots.

The Ocean Village concept seems to be a failed one. It tries to run a cruise for 30 to 50 somethings but the average age on both cruises I have taken has to be well over 60. Many of the public area are still in the style of P&O and the younger 'Ocean Village' concept doesn't come off. The two concepts cancel each other out. It seems to be a cheap cruise rather than a cruise for those who don't do cruises. Everything seems to be SELL SELL SELL from art to drinks to tours. Eg. tours are sold for Athens but no one tells you that it costs only 80cents to take the trains from the port to the centre of the toursit district.

Some bars were very slow and seemed short staffed on the cruise I took and standards of friendliness seem to have gone down over the last two and a half years.

Full board is far from the truth. I've been on a dozen cruises and have never had to pay for basic soft drinks and supplemental charges for all the other three restaurants.

Plantation served great food but after eating there everyday for a week it became boring.

The entire cruise is one long commercial, with practically every show, like the cook off, the art show and the fine gem show were basically formed to sell to you.

The entertainment was mediocre at best.

The ship was incredibly overloaded, just to get a sun chair you had to get out before 9am each day and even then over half were taken by towel markers, idiots that threw a towel down to get a chair, then went on an all day excursion whilst the poor souls on board couldn't find a chair.

The ship was very clean but it should be considering it was only a couple months old.

Staff were great, most were always smiling and wishing you a nice day.

The spa and everything in it cost more.

Buy the £35 pass as it allows you into an adults only area which provides you with some level of piece and quiet.

The Swedish massage with champagne and chocolate strawberries was a nice treat for my girlfriend and I, for £160 plus tip.

Hmm, what else, take money, take money and then take more money.

Despite the ship being advertised as being refitted and on it's maiden voyage, some areas were distinctly tatty. Just two examples were firstly, the bath fittings in our cabin were broken and secondly, the armrests on the bar stools in the coffee bar were threadbare.
The visit to Gibraltar was an absolute comedy of errors. Firstly we docked over an hour late, thanks to the decision to keep the ship outside the harbour to meet with the original Ocean Village liner. They had arranged a publicity shoot from a helicopter buzzing around overhead for nearly an hour. Then the computer system used to check passengers on and off the ship crashed, we eventually had a two and a quarter hour spell ashore, not the four hours we had planned. To add insult to injury, the boat broke down and we were tied up until after one o'clock the following morning, looking at the very place we had had such a short time to visit. Of course, this meant that the next port of call, Cartagena, was missed out altogether.
Ocean Village hails itself as being aimed at the 35-55 age group. I would hazard a guess that more than half the passengers were in the 65-75 age group, I am 49, not quite what we expected.

Although the staff on-board the Ocean Village were friendly, and the ship was very clean, I wouldn't recommend the Chiantis and Kasbahs cruise as it all seemed to be about getting the last penny from the customers. It was very expensive, as were the trips, and the drinks waiters were a bit like timeshare touts.

My family travelled on the Ocean Village, including two young people, and was totally disappointed.
The cabin was drab.
The food was bland.
The entertainment was not even up to holiday camp standard.

Ocean Village Cruises in a word - YUK!
Shepherd's Pie, Cottage Pie, Cheese & Pickle Rolls - thank's but I can get that at home.

Queues in restaurants - not even a cruet set on the table.

Sell, sell, sell - overpriced mediocre wines, overpriced drinks, overpriced excursions - with exagerated promises.

Taken many a holiday and cruise. This is advertised as 4 star - more like a poor relation to Butlins. Not even 1 star from my family.

We were there on a paticularly bad week, but I can only write this review on my experiences of Ocean Village.
Norovirus on board , menu not as advertised and very poor quality food were problems on our week.
Unhappy with enertainment and reminded us of Pontins (not as good as Butlins).

I travelled on the Trans Atlantic positioning voyage from Palma to Barbados on Caribbean Ocean Village. Given that we were going to have 5 full days at Sea, you would have thought that the Head of Entertainment ( No Cruise Director - Too Formal ) would have pulled out the stops to amke the crossing fun - In a word No. The acts were apalling - Straight from the U.K. Holiday Park scene.

Even Airtours offer a decent Cruise product, with waiter service, and decent Entertainment.

The Bar Service was slow, there tended to be a lack of staff.

Considering the price, for an extra £100.00, I could have had full P& O or Holland America, or Fred Olsen, next I will pay the extra

I cruised on the Ocean Village Xmas03/New Year04 14nights The destinations were exceptional.
The boat was poor.

Lower cabins smell odd and have poor soundproofing. If you retire to your bed before the Marquee does you're in for a treat!

If you gamble you'll be unimpressed with the Casino although the staff are entertaining.

The entertainment is pretty terrible really - and badly arranged. The Moon deck performance by heaven (?) was total rubbish. The night club - which was pleasant enough - never got going before 12...and often it just never got going. Which left the Marquee and it's carbon copy performances.

Food in the Bistro was very good - as was La Luna. If fact the Buffet food was good also.. but the self-service made me feel I was dining at a railway terminus or something.

Staff were almost useless on a knowledge level. Absolutely zero idea of where we were going or where we had come from. Annoying at times.

Perhaps I am being unfair. I have been given an insight to the Caribbean, and I will plan to go there again. Maybe even another cruise. But I can firmly say that I will never - ever - travel with Ocean Village again. It is simply not for me! Royal Caribbean blows them away in every single department!! I will keep an eye on Ocean village mind you....I give them 5 years tops.

p.s the lifts have a mind of their own......you have been warned!!!!