Variety Cruises Galileo Review by QuirkyCruise Reader Jay Katz

Variety Cruises Galileo

Reviewer

Jay Katz from USA.

Cruise Line

Variety Cruises.

Ship

The 49-passenger Galileo.

Destination

Greece.

# of Nights

8.

Departure Port

Athens, Greece.

Date of Cruise

Oct 18, 2024.

Ratings

(5=excellent, 4=very good, 3=good, 2=poor, 1=terrible)

-Overall Experience Rating: 1

-Food Rating: 3

-Service/Crew Rating: 1

-Cabin Rating: 1

-Itinerary Rating: 1

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Variety Cruises Galileo Review

Variety Cruise appears to support a culture of safety and comfort violations, false advertising, and doing the bare minimum possible. Specifically, Variety Cruises Galileo ship, Captain Christos, Hotel Manager George and Tour Director Vicky.

Our mom’s 80th birthday trip was ruined.

FALSE: “SAFETY & COMFORT”
********On the sundeck a 2.5 cm thick steel cable stay with steel chain at the end holding the central sailing mast, snapped with sound as loud as a gunshot and nearly took off my sister’s head. It hit the side of the vessel missing her head by a hair. I rushed to her thinking the worst, that she was severely injured. I held the cable down while another passenger went to alert the crew and tie it up. This was life threatening. Clearly the attachment point was rusted beyond its service life and should have been replaced prior to breaking. It was rusted out to approximately 5 mm wide while the other attachment points were 30 mm wide. Clearly indicating the ship has not undergone a safety inspection in many years. ********

Cabin 17 has a horrible moldy smell. I have been complaining to George several times a day, every day and he keeps saying there’s nothing he can do to fix it and no empty cabins to move us to.

George offered to spray perfume in the room, and I told him not to because I’m allergic. Either George or housekeeping then sprayed my mattress with perfume and I had an allergic reaction, sore throat, headache, and couldn’t sleep. The next morning, I dragged the perfumed mattress upstairs and handed it to him because i was so upset. The entire shipboard community saw me dragging the mattress up to him during breakfast.

There appears a seawater leak around the porthole as the wood around it is crystallized with salt. Bathroom has stained surfaces and shower grout is cracked and black with mold. Two other passengers had the same complaint to George about black mold in the bathroom also and difficulty getting it cleaned. George lied and said that it was black grout rather than mold. Fridge was broken (it was replaced).

When I was complaining about the mold in room 17, George lied that there’s a water sensor in each room in case of leaks, Capt Niko confirmed there is no such thing.

My allergic reaction to room 17 has subsided but my sister’s sore throat and headache continues to bother her. There were 2 other passengers cabins George could have moved us to that had crew in them. Plus 2 reservation agents were on the trip sailing free each with their own rooms who could have been combined.

We had planned to abandon the ship in Santorini due to the numerous health and safety concerns. However, the passengers in room 19 ended their trip early due to their dissatisfaction with Variety. George begrudgingly moved us into room 19 as if he was doing us a huge favor. Therefore, we stayed on the ship for the remainder of the voyage. But I had already reached out to corporate about the egregious issues occurring.

The boat was not built for the ocean, it is high with a flat bottom and no stabilizers, so it pitches and rolls uncomfortably in 1.5-meter seas, making my sister and a lot of people seasick.
Can’t sit anywhere near the stern of the boat because the diesel exhaust is so thick one cannot breathe comfortably.
Diesel engines so loud and run rough that it shakes your teeth sitting in the aft of the boat.
70db in the staterooms to 100db in the stern, constant sound of the engine’s ranges from annoying to dangerously loud. (Exposure to sound over 85db causes hearing damage.)

I’ve informed Vicky and George we have someone who gets seasick, we are concerned about the rough seas and asked if we should take Dramamine and George’s answer was “be a sailor”.

Didn’t have any towels available on the sun deck or mid-deck for 90% of the trip. So, when I brought the bed blanket up to the sun deck, George made a snarky comment.

The safety meeting on the 1st day of the voyage was negligent. None of the safety features were reviewed except for the location of the life rafts and where to meet in an emergency. No information was given on covid, seasickness, the vessels safety features, or any other concerns. They should’ve also warned about keeping the securely doors closed since they swing wildly in rough seas, my sister’s hand was badly bruised when the bathroom door slammed shut on it.

There was a complete lack of communication from the ship’s officers on weather conditions, seas, wave height and what to expect while under way. The only information we got was incomplete and secondhand or thirdhand when we pressed George or Vicky for it. This is negligent and should have been announced daily.

When we arrived at the marina the beginning of the voyage it started off on the wrong foot, we have an elderly parent who has trouble walking and they wouldn’t let our taxi in the marina gate to drop us and baggage. When I asked Vicki for a transfer to the airport at the end of the trip with the pickup directly from the ship instead of the top of the hill, she was rude.

There is an offensively strong perfume air freshener in the rooms & sprayed regularly by machine into the dining area causing allergic reactions. We had to dispose of the air fresheners in the rooms.

Captain Christos kept pushing to keep moving to the next port instead of just staying more time in that port to avoid rough seas. In fact we didn’t even get to disembark in Mikonos since the stop was so short.

There doesn’t appear to be any satellite communication on the bridge therefore in the event of an emergency there would be no way to call for help while at sea.

FALSE: “RENOVATED 2020”
Boat is worn out. Major stains on carpeting, sundeck outdoor seating, walls, sinks, broken deck chair.

Sundeck outdoor seating cushions. * Photo: Jay Katz

Metal surfaces are rusty. Broken navigation light on the bridge. The ships hull is dented, damaged with paint peeling in many places.Room 19 leaky porthole. Toilet intermittently didn’t flush. Carpet is not vacuumed around the edges.

Damaged looking deck equipment. * Photo: Jay Katz

Bathroom fixtures, tiles and grout are all stained. Bathroom sink cabinet was not secured to the wall and it bounced around.

Bathroom fixtures. * Photo: Jay Katz

Every one of our Duvets, sheets and towels were stained in all our rooms.

Water coming out brown from the faucet for one full day.

FALSE: “SAILER”
This is not a sailing trip. Not a sailing vessel, boat has no keel and the sails are just for show. The sails don’t do anything except look pretty.

Vicki and George promised 4 times that the sails would be raised, but the sails were never raised during the voyage. The whole point of coming was to take a sailing vessel. We wouldn’t have booked the trip without this.

FALSE: “TV, WIFI, CENTRAL MUSIC”
There is no Wi-Fi while at sea. George told us that the Wi-Fi for purchase is no better than using our own cell phone signal and that the ship has no satellite Internet service. Your brochure claims there is wifi. A typical ship would have a satellite Internet. We wouldn’t have booked the trip if we knew this.

There is no TV service at any time, we asked George, and his reply was ‘no tv’.

The ‘central music system’ doesn’t work in any room.

We missed hearing critical information on several occasions because shipboard announcements can only be heard from within the dining room. They cannot be heard from any other part of the ship due to the noise of the engines, and they are not broadcast in the cabins.

TV screens should have been used to communicate trip details, chartplotter maps, weather conditions, tour info, etc.

FALSE: “NON-DISCRIMINATION”
I made 4 attempts to speak to captain Christo and they won’t even acknowledge me while I’m standing in front of him. He turns away from me and refuse to speak to me or even acknowledge that I’m talking to him as if I wasn’t a person. This is beyond offensive. A clear case of discrimination.

Since the officers wouldn’t speak to me I asked Vickie, George and the kitchen manager if they could help me get a tour of the ship, and none of them could help. Finally one of the waiters assisted me but it was not his job. People should have worn name tags to be more accountable.

FALSE: “ENRICHING EXPERIENCES”
We took our mother on this trip with her 80th birthday. We put in a birthday request upon check in, and Vickie ignored it. It brought a cake out for another guest birthday and greatly embarrassed us since our mother thought it was for her.

Vicky seems like she’s mainly there to sell tours, she must be working on commission. She has an abrasive personality and was difficult to deal with.
Vickie kept telling us the tours were ok for people with mobility issues, they weren’t ok and caused pain-and-suffering.

The one day it was calm enough to swim we reminded her three times for snorkels and masks, but she left the boat without helping at all.

Captain’s dinner Oct 23 none of the captains attended and most passengers in their rooms due to the rough seas.
Greek dancers on-board were unprofessional. One couldn’t dance well, the other one chewed gum.

Another couple were so dissatisfied with Variety that they left the ship in Santorini.

FALSE: “USAGE OF SANITIZER ARE MANDATORY”
The entire voyage only 2 bottles of sanitizer’s were publicly displayed (the bar & the lounge). None from the ship made any effort to use them or encourage their use at any time. No sanitizer was provided upon boarding the ship or at mealtime as advertised.

None of the Covid cleaning or prevention steps advertised were performed.

FALSE: “CRUISING SPEED 11 KNOTS”
The boat went 9 kn, regardless if the water was rough or dead calm. The captain should have varied the speed based on the wave conditions for passenger comfort.

How many small-ship cruises under 300 pax have you been on?

12

Hope you found this Variety Cruises Galileo Reader Review insightful.