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An American Family on Costa Diadema


KatapultMike
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It seemsmost of the reviews on this site are from couples, and not very manyAmericans. So I thought I would post ourimpressions and some thoughts in particular regarding kids. Spoiler alert: we loved it! But I can see that Costa might not be foreveryone.

My family(me, my wife and two girls aged 11 and 13) went on a one week cruise on theCosta Diadema sailing form Savona on April 8. Basically a different port every day, with only one sea day. I was trying to expose my kids to as manyplaces as possible within our time constraints. While we succeeded in seeing a lot, we may have overdone it, as we wererushing around the whole week.

Timing. Our cruise was scheduled around my kid’sspring break from school. This seemedlike a great idea to me. I thought itwould be less crowded than the summer. I’m not sure it was. Our springbreak coincided with Easter week, so there were tons of people everywhere butespecially in the Vatican and other cathedrals in Italy. We were at the Vatican the day before GoodFriday. At our school, if Easter comesparticularly early or late, they will not schedule spring break around it. If you have a situation like that, I wouldsay go for it on spring break. I wouldnot recommend the Vatican during Easter Week. Our kids break was only one week. We flew out of San Francisco on Thursday night and returned a week and ahalf later on Monday afternoon. Kids hadto miss two school days and were actually not happy about that – they areserious students and didn’t want to miss any school, so we tried to minimizeit. It was really a lot ground to coverin that time. If we do it again I thinkwe will try the summer.

Kids on Costa. On our cruise, there were tons of kids, so you will have lots ofcompany. Our girls are 11 and 13, so wewere a little surprised when we were told on check-in that the initialorganizational meeting for the kids club would be at 11:30 p.m.! Italian kids stay out later than theirAmerican peers, and Italian families like to eat late. Our kids never participated in any of theorganized kid’s club events. Aside fromthe somewhat inconvenient hours, we were just too busy.

Ambiance. Hard to explain. The ship wasloud and bling, bling, bling everywhere. Lot of excitement, music, shows, kind of crazy. We actually liked it, but if you are lookingfor peace and quiet it’s hard to find. It was sometimes hard to figure out where things were, how they worked,or what was going on. All of the crewspoke adequate English for their jobs, but not always adequate to givedirections, and there seemed to be a lot of confusion on their part about howthings actually worked. So if you are acontrol freak and expect there to be some resource somewhere that finally anddefinitively spells everything out, I expect you are going to bedisappointed. If you can kick back andgo with the flow, you will have a great time.

Dress. Not nearly as formal as we expected. I had only been on one cruise before, on Norwegian years ago. On that trip, I actually brought two tuxedojackets, one black and one white, for the two gala nights. No need for that on Costa! Diadema had one gala night. I wore a blazer and tie for it and my girls(big and small) wore cocktail length dresses. Most people didn’t bother. Iwould say maybe 10% of the men were sporting a jacket and tie that night, andmaybe another 10% jacket no tie. Weactually packed pretty heavy for the trip as my girls were kind of into theidea of the theme nights (all white, tricolore, black and red). But when we saw how casual everyone else was,they didn’t want to bother to dress up. We could have packed a lot lighter and if we go again we will. The only theme night that had a highpercentage of participation was the White Nights. Most of the people that actually went to theWhite Nights party were wearing white.

You oftenhear in the US that “Europeans are better-dressed than Americans.” There is a lot packed into that statement,not least of which that “Europeans” is a pretty broad term, that includesdiverse populations that are not homogenous. I will leave that aside and address only the Europeans on our cruise(practically everyone on our cruise except us was European.). The second nuance is just what you mean by “betterdressed.” This can be used to meaneither (i) “more formally dressed” or (ii) “more stylishly or fashionably dressed.” I can say that, with respect to the Europeanson our cruise (i) was not true at all. Itused to be that you seldom saw adults in Europe wearing jeans, shorts orsneakers unless they were American tourists. This is absolutely no longer the case. I do not think people were dressed more formally than they would be at,say, a resort in the US. However, withrespect to (ii), dressing more stylishly, it is true. Everyone you saw just looked better than theaverage American in terms of their clothes. They were wearing the same general kinds of clothes, just wearing thembetter. Even families with little kidsmanaged to have everyone clean, matching (where appropriate or desirable!),newish and somehow just together and well turned out, all the time. So I would say, don’t worry about dressing uptoo much, but do try to bring your “A game” in terms of not wearing worn out clothesor mismatched outfits unless you want to stand out as a schlub.

Dining. Fabulous. I actually thought thefood alone was worth the price of the cruise, like they were throwing in theaccommodation and travel for free. Wewere assigned to the main dining room, Fiorentino, for the early seating fordinner, which was supposed to start at 6:30. Our biggest challenge of the whole cruise was getting there ontime! We basically never were ontime. The first night, it was about 8:00when we were ready for dinner, and they wouldn’t let us in. We went to the Corona Blu for dinner thatnight, which had open seating with the same menu as the main dining room andhad a great meal. We tried that againlater in the cruise but were rebuffed, and told that this option was only openfor those who had been assigned it as their dinner choice every night. Second night we got to the dining room around7:30. We bypassed the Maitre D’ byentering through the upper level and going down the internal staircase to getto our table. After we were seated, theMaitre D’ came back to our table and started yelling at me very animatedly in French. I speak French well enough to know what hewas saying, but not really well enough to go toe-to-toe with him in real time. He was actually justified at being annoyed atus – we were an hour late after all – but I thought the way he went about itwas more than a bit rude. So, Iresponded with my best Gallic shoulder shrug and a casual “D’ac” while Ireturned my attention to my aperitif (vermouth, light on the ice, with a lemontwist, not a wedge – I already had the bartender at the Stella del Sud trained!). This turned out to be the perfect response,as he sort of ran out of steam and stomped off, still in a huff. The rest of the week we struggled to getthere on time, and ate at the Adularia one night, which also had open seating,and at the buffet one night when we were really late. Although we only made it there half the time,the waiter at our assigned table in Fiorentino (Ahri) was great. Very attentive, perfect English, he wouldleave wine and water on the table so we could help ourselves (Piu Gusto drinkspackage is supposed to be by the glass only). He was the only waiter we really talked to much or got to know anythingabout on the whole ship. He was fromJakarta and was very interested that I had been there recently onbusiness. He was also the only person onthe ship that we tipped separately. Ifigured Costa’s 10 Euro per person per day could take care of the rest ofthem. On any given day you would likelyreceive service from literally dozens of people, not necessarily the same fromone day to the next, and I don’t see how you could tip them all individually. In general, the whole ship is run prettyefficiently, but it’s kind of an assembly line operation. You are waited on by tons of people, so it’sunderstandable if the service is not very warm or personal.

Overall, Ithought almost everything we ordered in the main dining room was good quality,with a thoughtful menu, well presented and served hot. There were usually two to four choices forthe main course, two for the other courses or maybe three for desert, alongwith several “always available” items. It was basically all an Italian menu, although varied and tendingtowards Northern Italian and a mix of more original dishes and traditionalones. It was not just spaghetti marinaraall week, have no fear. My wife was alittle disappointed they did not also feature more French or Spanish dishes butoverall we were very satisfied.

My kidsended up loving the formal dining. I wassort of surprised by this since normally they prefer buffets. They would bring a book or an iPad to dinnerand did not mind how long we took. Mywife and I would kick back, have a couple (or more!) glasses of wine and reallyenjoyed the pace, which would be considered very slow by American standards. We had a great table with views out bigwindows on the stern and a couple nights were able to see the sunset fromit. I helped my kids order andencouraged them to order most of the six courses on offer. They would try things and if they liked itthey would eat it. I never pressuredthem to eat anything. This worked great– they tried a lot of things they would not have otherwise, and ended up lovingsome of them. It was successful ingetting them to broaden their palates a little.

Breakfast. The buffet selection was pretty big. As many others have noted, it did not include eggs. But for a “continental” breakfast, there wasa lot on offer. I prefer complex carbsand protein for breakfast so usually selected whole grain bread, cold cuts andcheese. My wife likes fresh fruit forbreakfast and there were always several good choices including fabulous andfresh melon. My kids love pastries andsweets for breakfast and they were in absolute heaven. There was some really good prosciutto, whichI liked to have with the melon. In theUS, and I suppose in Italy as well, this is usually eaten as an appetizer atdinner, but it worked just fine for breakfast. I think even the pickiest eater should be able to find something theyliked here. It’s crowded, but manageableafter you learn your way around. If youabsolutely have to have bacon and eggs, it is only available in the main diningroom. We did this on the one seaday. I had an English Breakfast, whichwas awful. My wife had Eggs Benedict,which she thought was barely edible. Mykids ordered the Belgian Waffles with chocolate sauce and whipped crème, which theypronounced delicious. We didn’t botherwith the cooked breakfast after that.

Lunch. We only had lunch on the ship two days, the day we arrived and the seaday. The buffet both days was vast but insanelycrowded. The food was good, especiallythe roast suckling pig, but the mob scene sort of detracted from it.

Drinks. We got the “Piu Gusto” drinks package and I highly recommend it. Everyone in your cabin or traveling togetherhas to get the drinks package if anyone does, and I wasn’t sure if my kidswould get the value from it. I needn’thave worried. Kids enjoyed a steadystream of hot chocolate (including multiple flavor variations from the“chocolate bar”), smoothies and Shirley Temples and other virgin cocktails. They really liked being able to get whateverthey wanted whenever they wanted (I liked that too!). They normally are not allowed to drink sodaor other sugary drinks at home, so this was a treat. One funny thing about the drinks package isthat it included almost anything you could want to drink, but you could onlyget water by the glass, not a bottle. This was inconvenient if you wanted to have water in your cabin. I would basically stop by the nearest bar andget four glasses and carry them back to the cabin. Kind of silly.

Cabin. We booked last minute, and we had no flexibility on dates due to kid’sschool schedule. We got what I was toldwas the very last four person cabin on the ship, and that may have actuallybeen true as I got on a waitlist to upgrade but did not get anopportunity. The ship was very full dueto Easter holiday. The only cabinavailable was an interior one, with one queen bed and two bunk beds to thesides over it. Really cramped for fourpeople! My only prior cruise experiencewas with two people in a suite with a balcony on, if I recall, the top deck ofthe ship, so this was a different experience.

Havingsaid that, the cabin was laid out very well and efficiently with lots of storage. We hardly spent any time in the cabin,literally just sleeping, showering and changing clothes, and my familycooperated and made the best of it. If wedo it again we will upgrade to balcony cabin at a minimum, and maybe a suite. The best part about the cabin we had? I kept reminding myself what a great price wegot!

Shore excursions. We went on shore at every opportunity, and most days stayed as long aswe could. On three days, the days wherewe had more ground to cover, we booked tours through Costa. On two days we toured on our own. I thought the Costa tours were well run,interesting and packed a lot in. I wasaware that we could book tours independently and save some money. I was afraid that if we toured independentlyand were late returning to the ship, we might get left behand. If we were on a bus full of people who wereall late on a Costa-booked cruise, I figured they would have to wait for us orat least put us up and get us to the next port or something. This theory got tested on our day in LaSpezia. It was Good Friday, and we didthe longest, most jam-packed tour available, going to Florence and Pisa (In oneday! This is probably a criminal act,and if not it should be.). Every placewas swarming with tourists, and the bus was quite late getting back. But they waited for us!

Price. Ithought the whole thing was very reasonably priced, and if you spend a fewminutes pricing cruises on websites you will see Costa is consistentlycompetitive or lower than the competition. I felt we got good value for money.

Travel Tips. We flew into Milan via Istanbul on Turkish Airways. I think a lot people, especially Americans,are afraid to go through Istanbul, and many of our friends scrunched up theirnoses when we said we were flying Turkish. I think this is misguided. Althoughthere have been terrorist incidents in Turkey, nowhere is immune from this intoday’s world, and when you factor overall crime rates, I believe you are saferthere than in many American cities. Becauseof this skittishness, Turkish Airlines is offering great fares right now. It is an old school “flag carrier” whichmeans service is far superior to what you will get on an American airline in theback of the plane. I chose the longestlayover in Istanbul offered, 24 hours. We booked a hotel in the Old Town, toured some historic sights, had a greatmeal and overall had a wonderful finale to our vacation. Highly recommend both Turkish Airways and astop in Istanbul.

We hadaccess to airport lounges in Milan and Istanbul through “Priority Pass” whichis offered as a perk through many credit cards in the US (and I assume worldwide). This is a very valuable bonus and made the layoversmuch less stressful. My kids normallyget pretty cranky waiting in airports, but with a clean, comfortable place tosit, wifi, snacks and drinks, they really didn’t care when the plane left! If you don’t otherwise have lounge access youshould look into it.

Bottom Line. If you want a high energy, fun-packed experience that covers maximumground in a limited time in a part of the world rich in history, Costa Diadema,should be on your list. You should thinktwice before going to Rome Easter Week, however. If you want to kick back and relax on springbreak, I suggest you might want to look into Club Med in Mexico! For us, I think we will do it again, likelyEastern Mediterranean next time, but will probably go in summer, book a biggercabin and not try to do everything in one week.

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thanks for your time writing the review. Was verry interesting to see american point of view on Costa.

we spend 2 weeks in 2016 on Costa Magica and it was ...just magic.

cant wait to return on Costa in Nov.

in meantime we will go try HAL and see differences

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Glad to hear things worked out well for you and your family. We had also looked at Turkish Air, I'd heard their in-flight service was good, and as you said the prices were really good. We ended up on BA via Heathrow as it was a more direct route to Barcelona and Turkish Air's layovers were really long. But it looks like you made the most of your long layover! The issue with Heathrow is always the complexity of making a connection, bus, train, long walks...

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What a great comprehensive review and so interesting to hear from an American family point of view. We are a couple from the UK who love Costa and we always think it looks tremendous fun for families although we are very happy to seek out little quiet spots ourselves most of the time. However, we DO enjoy the nightlife on board to the full.

 

Our motto is to go with an open mind and with the intention of enjoying yourself and you won't be disappointed.

 

By the way, if you do decide to do this again I'd advise booking as early as possible to get the choice and location of cabin best suited to your needs. Personally, we think the cabins are great and if you do your research beforehand and early enough you should get what suits you best.

 

Agree with you regarding Costa's itinerary, too, as we find something interesting to do in each port or nearby. We were on the Diadema last year and we shall be back on board again in a couiple of weeks. Thank you again for taking the time to submit your review.

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Ejincali, hi, neighbor! Great to know there is at least one other Northern Californian Costa cruiser.

 

Alex & Bobbingbob, thanks.

 

Does anyone know if it is possible to edit a post after putting it up? I wrote out the above in Word fist, and then copied onto this site. For some reason I couldn't get "Preview Post" to work, so I just submitted it. Somewhere in that process, the spacing was thrown off and a lot of the words ran together. Really hard to read now, so thanks to all of those who made the effort! I would like to go back in and correct it, but don't know how to edit the post. Anyone know if this is possible?

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Great well balanced and well written review, thanks.

 

Editing your own messages is based on the time limit that the administrator has set, I think here on the Costa forum you have something like 15 or 20 minutes to edit the message after it has been sent.

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Thank you for taking the time to do a review from the American perspective.

I recently did a transatlantic on Costa Favolosa and loved it.

 

I do think you tried to see/do too much in a week and perhaps next time use one of the days as a day off so to speak. Also coming an hour or more late for dinner every night is not fair to your waiter. Did you ask to change to late dining?

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I also think that either you should have spoken to the Maître D' to get a change of your dining time or made more effort to get to your table within a reasonable time, it really puts a lot of pressure on waiters when people turn up much over 15 minutes.

 

That said fabulous review from an English speaking guest, and very helpful to others who may think about trying Costa for the first time.

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My husband and I loved everything about our Costa Luminosa cruise last May. We have another Costa cruise booked for October, 2017. I thought it was great being the only Americans on the ship and my turquoise jewelry and southwestern type clothing was a big hit with the Italians!

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I thought it was great being the only Americans on the ship and my turquoise jewelry and southwestern type clothing was a big hit with the Italians!

 

We enjoyed being pretty much the only Americans aboard as well. Unfortunately, I didn't get any compliments on my jewelry or clothes, but I'm kind of used to that. :(

 

To those who have told me we were inconsiderate being late for dinner: guilty as charged.

 

I don't think the late seating would have worked for us though. Starting dinner at 9:30 or whenever it was would mean finishing at 11:00 or 11:30, and my youngest would be slumped over the table by then. There is really no in-between offered for the fixed dinner times, its a choice between too early or too late. I think the ideal solution for us would be the open seating at Corona Blu, and that is what we will ask for next time.

 

I hope people don't take my review as being anti-Costa. We actually loved it and had a great time. I am just trying to give some info to help others who are in a similar situation to us to make an informed decision.

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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 4 weeks later...

Thanks for the tip on the Istanbul layover. We were strongly advised not to travel there last year and we loved it. We felt very safe and want to go back. Did you have to call Turkish Airlines direct to get it?

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Thanks for the in depth review! : ) We're an American family cruising with Costa for the first time next week. I know your kids didn't participate in the kids club, but do you happen to know if they have hours during the day so my husband and I can do an excursion alone? We have a 4, 7 and 11 year old and were really hoping to not have to haul the 4 year and 7 year old through all the streets and towns we want to see.

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It's been a long time since I've been on Costa, so I don't know the answer: as you had the early seating at your (presumably) table for 4, did your late appearances merely cause your waiter extra problems in serving you out of order with his other tables or did it create a problem for late seating diners at your table? I'm wondering if you noticed how that was handled?

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Thanks for the in depth review! : ) We're an American family cruising with Costa for the first time next week. I know your kids didn't participate in the kids club, but do you happen to know if they have hours during the day so my husband and I can do an excursion alone? We have a 4, 7 and 11 year old and were really hoping to not have to haul the 4 year and 7 year old through all the streets and towns we want to see.

The Costa kids club is called Squok Club, there are 3 age group clubs, Mini 3 to 6 years, Maxi 7 to 11 and Teens 12-17.

 

The normal opening times for the first two clubs are approxiamtely 09:00 to 23:00, of course you can pickup the little darlings at anytime. The actual opening times may vary but will be stated in the daily program. All the kids councellors are multi-lingual, also have lunch and dinner with the kids.

 

http://www.costacruises.co.uk/gb/cruise-life/children-young-people-cruises.html

 

 

There are two activities (both chargeable) "Princess for a Day" and "Captain for a Day", where the girls are dressed in fairy tale dresses and the boys in Captain uniform. I don't know if the following links will get through, if not just Google Costa Cruises and the Princess or Captain for a Day:

 

https://www.reasonstocruise.com/costa-captain/

 

https://www.porthole.com/costa-cruises-makes-junior-cruisers-captains-for-a-day-cruise-news-aug-27-2015/

 

Have a great cruise.

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I'm also doing an Istanbul stopover on my way out to Dubai. My agent arranged it very easily with Turkish, same fare as booking myself on Internet., He also says Turkish is a good product;

American Family is being a bit hard on his countrymen, I went through Paris CDG a while ago, the line at Schengen exit, there was one group of ballcap slobs but the rest of the Americans, you could only tell by their passports.

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  • 1 month later...
Thanks for the tip on the Istanbul layover. We were strongly advised not to travel there last year and we loved it. We felt very safe and want to go back. Did you have to call Turkish Airlines direct to get it?

 

Sorry, everyone, have not been monitoring this Board for a while! Starting to think about doing it again so thought I would check in.

 

The Istanbul layover was very, very, easy, really just like traveling in Europe or "anywhere else." The idea came to me because I kept seeing Turkish Airlines pop up with extremely competitive fares from San Francisco to Milan via Istanbul. Turkish seems to be included on all the major US internet travel sites. No need to book direct with Turkish. I ended up booking it through Orbitz, but got a price adjustment when I found it for slightly less on one of the more dodgy travel websites. Turkish is a member of Star Alliance so your frequent flyer miles will transfer to United and other Star Alliance members. Service was great on the plane.

 

Booked the DoubleTree Sirkeci, which is walking distance to the Hagia Sophia, Blue Mosque, etc. Booked that online as well, I think through Hotels.com but I don't recall. Great hotel, very reasonable rate compared to California, booked a two room suite. No advance arrangements for transportation, just came out of airport and got a taxi, no problem.

 

I would definitely repeat Istanbul stopover if Turkish Airlines rates stay so low. As long as people are afraid to go there, I imagine there will be deals there.

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It's been a long time since I've been on Costa, so I don't know the answer: as you had the early seating at your (presumably) table for 4, did your late appearances merely cause your waiter extra problems in serving you out of order with his other tables or did it create a problem for late seating diners at your table? I'm wondering if you noticed how that was handled?

 

The former. Waiter handled it was grace and efficiency, but we still needed to clear out for the second seating. They chase everyone out.

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Bananapops21 - sorry I didn't see your question in time. Didn't use the kids club so couldn't have helped in any case.

 

DancerBob - you may well be right that I am too harsh on my countrymen's sartorial standards. I lived in Europe for most of the 80's, when the contrast was much starker than today, and I may have a permanent chip on my shoulder from that experience.

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KatapultMike

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Joined Feb 2017

Posted May 9th, 2017, 10:58 PM

 

An American Family on Costa Diadema

It seems most of the reviews on this site are from couples, and not very many Americans. So I thought I would post our impressions and some thoughts in particular regarding kids. Spoiler alert: we loved it! But I can see that Coats might not be for everyone.

My family(me, my wife and two girls aged 11 and 13) went on a one week cruise on thermostat Diadems sailing form Savonarola on April 8. Basically a different port every day, with only one sea day. I was trying to expose my kids to as many places as possible within our time constraints. While we succeeded in seeing a lot, we may have overdone it, as we were rushing around the whole week.

Timing. Our cruise was scheduled around my kid's spring break from school. This seemed like a great idea to me. I thought it would be less crowded than the summer. I’m not sure it was. Our spring break coincided with Easter week, so there were tons of people everywhere but especially in the Vatican and other cathedrals in Italy. We were at the Vatican the day before Good Friday. At our school, if Easter comes particularly early or late, they will not schedule spring break around it. If you have a situation like that, I would say go for it on spring break. I wouldn't recommend the Vatican during Easter Week. Our kids break was only one week. We flew out of San Francisco on Thursday night and returned a week and half later on Monday afternoon. Kids had to miss two school days and were actually not happy about that – they are serious students and didn’t want to miss any school, so we tried to minimize it. It was really a lot ground to covering that time. If we do it again I think we will try the summer.

Kids on Coats. On our cruise, there were tons of kids, so you will have lots of company. Our girls are 11 and 13, so we were a little surprised when we were told on check-in that the initial organizational meeting for the kids club would be at 11:30 pm.! Italian kids stay out later than their American peers, and Italian families like to eat late. Our kids never participated in any of the organized kid’s club events. Aside from the somewhat inconvenient hours, we were just too busy.

Ambiance. Hard to explain. The ship was loud and bling, bling, bling everywhere. Lot of excitement, music, shows, kind of crazy. We actually liked it, but if you are looking for peace and quiet it’s hard to find. It was sometimes hard to figure out where things were, how they worked, or what was going on. All of the crew spoke adequate English for their jobs, but not always adequate to give directions, and there seemed to be a lot of confusion on their part about how things actually worked. So if you are control freak and expect there to be some resource somewhere that finally and definitively spells everything out, I expect you are going to be disappointed. If you can kick back and go with the flow, you will have a great time.

Dress. Not nearly as formal as we expected. I had only been on one cruise before, on Norwegian years ago. On that trip, I actually brought two tuxedo jackets, one black and one white, for the two gala nights. No need for that on Coats! Diadems had one gala night. I wore a blazer and tie for it and my girls(big and small) wore cocktail length dresses. Most people didn’t bother. Would say maybe 10% of the men were sporting a jacket and tie that night, and maybe another 10% jacket no tie. We actually packed pretty heavy for the trip as my girls were kind of into the idea of the theme nights (all white, tricolor, black and red). But when we saw how casual everyone else was, they didn’t want to bother to dress up. We could have packed a lot lighter and if we go again we will. The only theme night that had a high percentage of participation was the White Nights. Most of the people that actually went to the White Nights party were wearing white.

You often hear in the US that “Europeans are better-dressed than Americans.” There is a lot packed into that statement, not least of which that “Europeans” is a pretty broad term, that includes diverse populations that are not homogeneous. I will leave that aside and address only the Europeans on our cruise(practically everyone on our cruise except us was European.). The second nuance is just what you mean by “better dressed.” This can be used to mean either (i) “more formally dressed” or (ii) “more stylishly or fashionably dressed.” I can say that, with respect to the European son our cruise (i) was not true at all. It used to be that you seldom saw adults in Europe wearing jeans, shorts or sneakers unless they were American tourists. This is absolutely no longer the case. I do not think people were dressed more formally than they would be at,say, a resort in the US. However, with respect to (ii), dressing more stylishly, it is true. Everyone you saw just looked better than the average American in terms of their clothes. They were wearing the same general kinds of clothes, just wearing them better. Even families with little kids managed to have everyone clean, matching (where appropriate or desirable!),shrewish and somehow just together and well turned out, all the time. So I would say, don’t worry about dressing up too much, but do try to bring your “A game” in terms of not wearing worn out clothes or mismatched outfits unless you want to stand out as a schlep.

Dining. Fabulous. I actually thought the food alone was worth the price of the cruise, like they were throwing in the accommodation and travel for free. We were assigned to the main dining room, Fiorentino, for the early seating for dinner, which was supposed to start at 6:30. Our biggest challenge of the whole cruise was getting there onetime! We basically never were onetime. The first night, it was about 8:00when we were ready for dinner, and they wouldn’t let us in. We went to the Corona Blu for dinner that night, which had open seating with the same menu as the main dining room and had a great meal. We tried that again later in the cruise but were rebuffed, and told that this option was only open for those who had been assigned it as their dinner choice every night. Second night we got to the dining room around7:30. We bypassed the Maitre D’ by entering through the upper level and going down the internal staircase to getto our table. After we were seated, Lemaitre D’ came back to our table and started yelling at me very animatedly in French. I speak French well enough to know what hews saying, but not really well enough to go toe-to-toe with him in real time. He was actually justified at being annoyed taus – we were an hour late after all – but I thought the way he went about twas more than a bit rude. So, I responded with my best Gallic shoulder shrug and a casual “D’ac” while I returned my attention to my aperitif (vermouth, light on the ice, with a lemon twist, not a wedge – I already had the bartender at the Stella del Sud trained!). This turned out to be the perfect response, as he sort of ran out of steam and stomped off, still in a huff. The rest of the week we struggled to getthere on time, and ate at the Adularia one night, which also had open seating, and at the buffet one night when we were really late. Although we only made it there half the time, the waiter at our assigned table in Fiorentino (Ahri) was great. Very attentive, perfect English, he would leave wine and water on the table so we could help ourselves (Piu Gusto drinks package is supposed to be by the glass only). He was the only waiter we really talked to much or got to know anything about on the whole ship. He was from Jakarta and was very interested that I had been there recently on business. He was also the only person on the ship that we tipped separately. I figured Costa’s 10 Euro per person per day could take care of the rest of them. On any given day you would likely receive service from literally dozens of people, not necessarily the same from one day to the next, and I don’t see how you could tip them all individually. In general, the whole ship is run pretty efficiently, but it’s kind of an assembly line operation. You are waited on by tons of people, so it's understandable if the service is not very warm or personal.

Overall, I thought almost everything we ordered in the main dining room was good quality,with a thoughtful menu, well presented and served hot. There were usually two to four choices for the main course, two for the other courses or maybe three for desert, along with several “always available” items. It was basically all an Italian menu, although varied and tending towards Northern Italian and a mix of more original dishes and traditional ones. It was not just spaghetti marinara all week, have no fear. My wife was a little disappointed they did not also feature more French or Spanish dishes but overall we were very satisfied.

My kids ended up loving the formal dining. I was sort of surprised by this since normally they prefer buffets. They would bring a book or an iPad to dinner and did not mind how long we took. My wife and I would kick back, have a couple (or more!) glasses of wine and really enjoyed the pace, which would be considered very slow by American standards. We had a great table with views out big windows on the stern and a couple nights were able to see the sunset from it. I helped my kids order and encouraged them to order most of the six courses on offer. They would try things and if they liked it they would eat it. I never pressured them to eat anything. This worked great– they tried a lot of things they would not have otherwise, and ended up loving some of them. It was successful in getting them to broaden their palates a little.

Breakfast. The buffet selection was pretty big. As many others have noted, it did not include eggs. But for a “continental” breakfast, there was a lot on offer. I prefer complex carbs and protein for breakfast so usually selected whole grain bread, cold cuts and cheese. My wife likes fresh fruit for breakfast and there were always several good choices including fabulous and fresh melon. My kids love pastries and sweets for breakfast and they were in absolute heaven. There was some really good prosciutto, which I liked to have with the melon. In the Us, and I suppose in Italy as well, this is usually eaten as an appetizer at dinner, but it worked just fine for breakfast. I think even the pickiest eater should be able to find something they liked here. It’s crowded, but manageable after you learn your way around. If you absolutely have to have bacon and eggs, it is only available in the main dining room. We did this on the one sea day. I had an English Breakfast, which was awful. My wife had Eggs Benedict, which she thought was barely edible. My kids ordered the Belgian Waffles with chocolate sauce and whipped crème, which they pronounced delicious. We didn’t bother with the cooked breakfast after that.

Lunch. We only had lunch on the ship two days, the day we arrived and the sea day. The buffet both days was vast but insanely crowded. The food was good, especially the roast suckling pig, but the mob scene sort of detracted from it.

Drinks. We got the “Piu Gusto” drinks package and I highly recommend it. Everyone in your cabin or traveling together has to get the drinks package if anyone does, and I wasn’t sure if my kids would get the value from it. I needn't have worried. Kids enjoyed a steady stream of hot chocolate (including multiple flavor variations from the“ chocolate bar”), smoothies and Shirley Temples and other virgin cocktails. They really liked being able to get whatever they wanted whenever they wanted (I liked that too!). They normally are not allowed to drink soda or other sugary drinks at home, so this was a treat. One funny thing about the drinks package is that it included almost anything you could want to drink, but you could only get water by the glass, not a bottle. This was inconvenient if you wanted to have water in your cabin. I would basically stop by the nearest bar and get four glasses and carry them back to the cabin. Kind of silly.

Cabin. We booked last minute, and we had no flexibility on dates due to kid's school schedule. We got what I was told was the very last four person cabin on the ship, and that may have actually been true as I got on a wait list to upgrade but did not get an opportunity. The ship was very full duets Easter holiday. The only cabin available was an interior one, with one queen bed and two bunk beds to the sides over it. Really cramped for four people! My only prior cruise experience was with two people in a suite with a balcony on, if I recall, the top deck of the ship, so this was a different experience.

Having said that, the cabin was laid out very well and efficiently with lots of storage. We hardly spent any time in the cabin, literally just sleeping, showering and changing clothes, and my family cooperated and made the best of it. If we do it again we will upgrade to balcony cabin at a minimum, and maybe a suite. The best part about the cabin we had? I kept reminding myself what a great price we got!

Shore excursions. We went on shore at every opportunity, and most days stayed as long as we could. On three days, the days where we had more ground to cover, we booked tours through Coats. On two days we toured on our own. I thought the Coats tours were well run, interesting and packed a lot in. I was aware that we could book tours independently and save some money. I was afraid that if we toured independently and were late returning to the ship, we might get left behind. If we were on a bus full of people who were all late on a Costa-booked cruise, I figured they would have to wait for us or at least put us up and get us to the next port or something. This theory got tested on our day in LaSpezia. It was Good Friday, and we did the longest, most jam-packed tour available, going to Florence and Pisa (In one day! This is probably a criminal act, and if not it should be.). Every place was swarming with tourists, and the bus was quite late getting back. But they waited for us!

Price. I thought the whole thing was very reasonably priced, and if you spend a few minutes pricing cruises on websites you will see Coats is consistently competitive or lower than the competition. I felt we got good value for money.

Travel Tips. We flew into Milan via Istanbul on Turkish Airways. I think a lot people, especially Americans,are afraid to go through Istanbul, and many of our friends scrunched up their noses when we said we were flying Turkish. I think this is misguided. Although there have been terrorist incidents in Turkey, nowhere is immune from this in today's world, and when you factor overall crime rates, I believe you are safer there than in many American cities. Because of this skittishness, Turkish Airlines is offering great fares right now. It is an old school “flag carrier” which means service is far superior to what you will get on an American airline in the back of the plane. I chose the longest layover in Istanbul offered, 24 hours. We booked a hotel in the Old Town, toured some historic sights, had a great meal and overall had a wonderful finale to our vacation. Highly recommend both Turkish Airways and atop in Istanbul.

We had access to airport lounges in Milan and Istanbul through “Priority Pass” which is offered as a perk through many credit cards in the US (and I assume worldwide). This is a very valuable bonus and made the layovers much less stressful. My kids normally get pretty cranky waiting in airports, but with a clean, comfortable place to sit, wifi, snacks and drinks, they really didn’t care when the plane left! If you don’t otherwise have lounge access you should look into it.

Bottom Line. If you want a high energy, fun-packed experience that covers maximum ground in a limited time in a part of the world rich in history, Coats Diadema, should be on your list. You should think twice before going to Rome Easter Week, however. If you want to kick back and relax on spring break, I suggest you might want to look into Club Med in Mexico! For us, I think we will do it again, likely Eastern Mediterranean next time, but will probably go in summer, book a bigger cabin and not try to do everything in one week.

Edited by red29er
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