Same thing happened to us onboard the M/S H&B I. There are actually two ships, the H&B I and H&B II. We thought we were booked on the H&B II - the newer ship, but when we arrived we were on the H&B I and were told that the H&B II did not pass inspection by the Greek Ministry. Our trip was in May of this year. We got the same "canned" response from our agent. We do not recommend the H&BI as it does not meet normal American standards. A seweage smell in the bathroom and sleeping area the entire length of the trip coupled with no hot water does not make time onboard pleasant.

We took this cruise last year. The room and bathroom smelled like a latrine for all 7 days. Passengers slept in the lounge/dining room to get away from the terrible smell. We also asked for a refund. Response was the same. If you can't trust your Travel Agent to look out for you, what are the alternatives? We have told all our friends and anyone else who asks about our trip to avoid the m/s H&B I or II - People who ask are potential passengers and every passenger they lose cannot help their business. These people need to learn some PR in handling such problems. We have not heard since of even one sailing that was sold out - usually less than 20 are onboard. We suspect the H&B II was sidelined and did not pass Inspection because of this problem. The H&B I should also be sidelined. We definitely would never recommend them.

We have been invited to make a slide presentation and travel talk about our trip, as well as write an article for publication in the Travel Section of most US major newspapers. Thanks for the other posts. They substantiate our claim regarding this ship. Anyone else who would like to contribute, leave your email address and we will contact you.

Thanks a million...we had almost reached the decision to book a cruise on this ship....sounds so great on their website..the idea of bathroom odors in the cabin totally turned us off......and I need and expect a hot shower every day....how can they get away with this ... we will look elsewhere.

The odor problem still has not been fixed. Problem existed on June 2006 cruises as well. Crew well aware of odor problem attempting to disguise it with room deodorizers and keeping the teeny portholes open all the time despite that the air conditioning is also running. Has anyone had lingering health problems as a result? (Email me details if you have been affected.) Several were sick on our cruise but we passed it off as seasickness due to rough and choppy seas. Maybe the illness was due to inadequate hot water in cleaning and santizing the dishes. This ship needs to be inspected again NOW.

Will contact ElizabethUSA regarding our health and illness issues while on this trip. Had never connected the dots to unsanitized dishes due to lack of hot water to our illnesses. Had several episodes of vomiting that occured, once even while in port that could not have been from rough seas. Very unpleasant to have to retreat to a sewage smelling cabin and bathroom. Had never had seasickness before and were very surprised when so many got sick at the same time. We have a list of everyone onboard our cruise and will contact each and every one of them to see if anybody has lingering health issues and direct them to this site to post. Thanks for getting this thread going.

We echo all that has been said here plus adding a few additional comments. We, too, requested a refund. There were 3 in our party so the latrine odors were in both cabins and we kept thinking they would do something about it. The excuse and response we got from our travel agent upon our return was that it could not be fixed while we were sailing. It's probably not be fixable. For almost $200 per person per day, our expectations were for comfortable and pleasant rooms. Take your money elsewhere - maybe, take the ferries to the islands you want to visit and book a hotel there.

This is just disgusting. Can you contact the owner of Viking? It makes them look very bad.

If this ship sailed under the American Flag, it would still be in a port somewhere and under inspection by the Health Department. Very, very alarming.

Viking Cruises and Nexus Cruises know about this. Passengers have complained verbally, as well as in writing. Basically, they continue to ignore the criticism and pass it off as being caused by the passengers. Evidence suggests there is a serious engineering flaw in the water system that affects the sewage facility and hot water capacity or that water system has been compromised to the extent they cannot correct it without major repairs that they apparently are unwilling to undertake.

Ditto all the comments for us. We would never recommend our travel agent who arranged this trip. We will never use that agent again. We both slept in the lounge area whenever there was space. We felt the crew was lying to us when they assured us they were fixing the problem. We tipped accordingly - at least they could have been honest about not being able to do anything. Take your money elsewhere - it is not worth $200 a day to have your space smell like an outhouse.

Just received an email from somebody who had planned to book a large group on the H&B. Said they were very close to chartering the whole ship at over $58,000 but have backed out totally. Said to pass her thanks on to this thread. Said there would have been "mutiny" on the Greek Seas if bathrooms smelled and were disgusting.

Have any of you who have been on this ship thought of suing your American Travel agents? Seems like they are falsely advertising a ship to be something that it is not - safe, comfortable, sanitary, etc. Why has your Travel Agent not tried to "satisfy the customer?" Travel agents depend on commissions and an unhappy customer means bad publicity and termination of their services. Word of mouth by any and all of these passengers travels very quickly in the cruising world community. I am a Travel Agent and would have done something to appease any customer to keep their business and their mouth shut. A partial refund (my commission, at least) usually works pretty well and is well worth it.

We have been contacted by several other motoring type ship companies who promise that we will not experience this problem. We will be investigating all of them. Thanks.

There are two commonly known principles of customer service that the management of H&B appears to have forgotten: 1) It costs significantly more to attract a new customer than hold onto an existing one. 2) A customer with a negative experience will share that experience with significantly more people than a customer with a positive experience

we took also a 7 days Greek Islandes on the m/s H&B this year and everything was great. we will return next year also !

Gosh, Yachting, you logged onto this site for the first time, first post, and you are praising this cruise line?

What do you think, we woke up on the mid-watch?

....we just had very good time..so simple...is this so bad ? everybody has his own opinion and as i can see, here, its also anonymous..

Yachting - why would someone who is claiming to have taken a cruise as recently as this year and liked it so much that they would go again next year want to make their comments anonymously? Anonymous complaints are understandable. Positive ones are not. If your experience was so positive why not at least leave your email address? We would like to know more - when did you supposedly take the cruise? What cabin were you supposedly in? We never said we didn't like the crew, the Captain, the itinerary or the Cruise Manager. We did say we didn't like the odors in the bathrooms and sleeping quarters. Prove to us that your comments are legitimate and that you were a cruiser and not a travel agent or other person connected with the H&B. Previous comments here can be substantied by the surveys that were completed by past passengers. How a company responds to a written complaint can often determine a longer lasting reputation. So far, the response from them was unacceptable, thus the reason for even starting this forum.

I don’t think that I have to prove anything regarding my comments; I just added my personal experience as you also did without any other prove. I don’t like to be anybody’s advertiser. your opinion and experience is respectable.

We actually paid $100 extra per person for one of these smelly rooms.

We guess yachting's room did not smell badly. Maybe next summer it will and THEN they will understand what it is like to have nowhere to go to escape the smell except the tiny lounge area at night. Maybe the problem has been fixed.

"A cruise ship is not simply a method of getting somewhere. A cruise ship is a destination in itself." (author unknown) Be choosy. Do your homework and maybe, just maybe, you will not have this type of experience. The internet is a great place to start.

I truly believe one can best rate a cruise adventure by how well the cruise line responds to its failings. Please post any other response that some of the passengers may have gotten. Did everyone get the same "canned" response? We really like one of the trips that Nexus Cruise and Yachts has on their website. Is that the same outfit?

Yes, Richard.

Does anyone know if Viking Cruises and Nexus Cruises have cleaned up their act on the H&B? Recommendations on their website appear to have been "cherry" picked from ratings sheets - perhaps?