curmudgeon98

I was afraid of that. We may have to stick to more upmarket lines like Oceania and Azamara where they have (mostly) kept decent libraries. If I'm doing 2+ weeks, especially with a number of sea days, I like to have a decent number of books available, and I'd rather not drag them in my suitcase.

I'm sorry I didn't take a picture of them, but has anyone else noticed the "all-singing, all-dancing" universal outlets that Onward has on each side of the bed since the refurb? They appear to accept (at least) UK, euro, and US plugs with no adapter required. That was a new one to me. I didn't have a multi-meter to verify actual voltage, but I did test with both euro and US plugs and they both seemed happy. The outlets by the desk were the more typical unique form factor ones.

There was a recent thread asking about Konigsdam library, which inspired me to ask about Eurodam and Nieuw Amsterdam. We haven't been on HAL in a few years, but are considering a Panama Canal cruise this fall. We prefer reading physical books, and a longer itinerary with fewer ports makes the library more important to us. I'm also a fan of the "take one, leave one" shelves; we usually board with a few paperbacks that we don't plan to take home. Does anyone have feedback on the size/state of the libraries on these ships? We were on a Princess ship recently, and while there was a library on the deck plan, the actual contents were about two dozen books.

When we were in the area a few years ago (land-based travel), my wife and daughter found the perfurmery only so-so as an experience; a mass tour that's pretty sales-oriented. Not horrible, but not a highlight. St P de V is definitely a cute example of the "perched village", and it's worth seeing at least one of those.

I think having the QR code (even if the checker doesn't actually call up the results on their own side) seems to make things go easier.

When we boarded there (one month ago), Azamara was NOT allowing early bag drop. It was specifically called out that way (in the cruise docs?). The temporary tent terminal in Ravenna is somewhat awkward. I could see this situation improving with time, but it seems like they are not set up to take bags early at present. There was no (listed) luggage storage at the train station, but sometimes you can track down a hotel or store which will hold bags for you in town (and then take a taxi to the terminal).

You will need to get MSC-specific details, as they have been operating a bit differently than some of the others. I think they will be using the dock in the container port, and I don't think you can take public transit (or even a taxi) into that part of Marghera. Presumably there will be a shuttle bus from somewhere, whether Tronchetto, Marittima, or ???

As others have mentioned, the menu is themed by various countries, and tends to have something like three hot appetizers, three cold appetizers, three mains from a specific region to choose from.

We used them for boarding our current cruise in Ravenna. For whatever reason the audio wouldn't work in the app on my android phone, so we ended up using my laptop for the testing. Definitely something where you want a quiet hotel room and a flat table/desk when you do the test. Something to help prop the camera in position helps as well.

We found WIndows in the evening to be the biggest disappointment on the food front of our current Onward cruise. Maybe we struck a particularly bad night, but we felt it had the stale and lukewarm food of the buffet, but lacked variety and the ability to see/pick out specific portions. Yes, you had (slightly erratic) table service, but the actual food reminded me more of school cafeteria fare. Breakfasts in Windows are fine, and I think lunch might be OK as well (we've mostly eaten lunch ashore or at the Patio), but I think they just haven't figured out how to make dinner work with low volume of guests. Food has been great otherwise.

Another gorgeous day, this time in Gythion, which is a cute little fishing village at the south of mainland Greece. The available excursions looked like quite a bit of driving, so we enjoyed lazing around the town and stopping for drinks and lunch along the waterfront. I thought we were the only ship in town (for weeks), but a big TUI ship (Mein Schiff 5?) has been hanging out here today, though I haven't seen them tendering. The onboard sprucing up continues; we got a new sofa yesterday which replaced the old sofabed apparently left over from Princess days. It's more comfortable, though a little narrower. Only downside is that internet connectivity has really gone into the tank; almost unusable. I'm not sure if this post will make it through.

Nice day in Corfu yesterday. There was a complimentary shuttle from the port to the old town. It's easy to see how Corfu could be a destination for a week or more by itself. Weather has been great. Azamazing evening was on the pool deck in two shifts; definitely not quite the same as the land versions, but still well done and enjoyable. Ships crew has continued to catch up on some of the bits and pieces left over from the renovation; our hall got all new room fridges, and lots of windows got washed. We got a request for mid-cruise feedback delivered to the cabin, and I really would have a hard time making any criticism. Breakfast on the balcony just arrived, so more later.

For the Azamara cruise this past weekend, there was no use of Marittima at all. I can't absolutely vouch for the Seabourn folks, but it seemed like everyone had their bags with them at Tronchetto and handed them over to the bus folks. Bag screening and security screening was done in the tent building at Ravenna dock.

Closing the loop on this, we are on Onward now. Internet has been pretty usable (480 passengers onboard). We've found that wifi calling has worked pretty well when we've used it. Talking to some folks who've been onboard the last two cruises, they've found facetime video calling worked often, but sometimes they drop back to audio only.

I think Azamara will end up needing to take some time to fine-tune the question of the Atlas bar. It is available as a place for sitting and relaxing during the day, but with a 70% passenger load, no place is very crowded on the ship right now. I've dropped into the Atlas bar at several points during this cruise, and found it having from zero to three customers. The Living Room has been pretty empty on this cruise as well, though not to the extent of the Atlas Bar.

I heard that passenger numbers this week are 480. I don't think these ships ever feel crowded, even when at max capacity, but the current level is very comfortable. We will be on for the next week as well. The brunch in the main dining room yesterday while arriving into Korcula was really excellent. I've been satisfied with the included wines, and I've really appreciated not getting the pushy upsell for more expensive bottles. Service in bars and restaurants has been excellent. There are definitely still catch-up maintenance items that weren't fully dealt with by the dockyard. I expect the crew will get to them over time. There are paint splatters on quite a few windows, especially in the Living Room. The door to our balcony is extremely hard to open; feels like the rollers are frozen. We called it in this morning, so we'll see when maintenance can get to it. I was a little surprised that we haven't had better docking or anchorage positions, but apparently because our itineraries are new, we are low on the port priority list.

I was at Tronchetto this past saturday for the Azamara bus transfer to Ravenna. The Seabourn bus was right next to us. The busses picked up at the circle driveway just at the end of the People Mover on Tronchetto. Both groups seemed to be fairly well organized. My only concern would be that there is very little shade or seating in that area, and no rain protection if the weather is bad.

We are in a standard V1 cabin, and I'm pretty happy with the condition. All the "soft goods" furnishings appear to be new (sofa, chair, bed, carpet, wall coverings). I think the desk/wardrobe replacement may have been on an "as needed" basis, but ours are in fine shape. If I had to pick something that doesn't look like new, I suppose the sink, if you look quite closely, has a few tiny chips in the surface. Around the ship there are a few unfinished corners, but you have to look for them. The only thing of note we've seen so far is that the changing room/showers for the fitness center aren't open yet. The bus ride from Venice took 2.5 hours for us; not especially scenic, but comfortable enough. If I were doing it again, I'd think about taking the train to Ravenna on our own. Organization at the port was reasonable, though I suspect that tent building could get pretty stuffy on a hot day. It probably helped that the other ship departing today was Seabourn, also fairly small. Dining room was well organized and smoothly running, uncrowded. Not sure what our passenger count is. I though food was up to the standard of our previous Azamara cruise - we'll see how it goes over the cruise.

It will be interesting to be sure. I was slightly caught out that today (Friday) is a 24-hour general strike day in Italy. Usually I look them up ahead of time (though often they are called off at last minute), but today we had walked across Venice and were planning to take the vaporetto back - no dice as only a few boats are running today... Good thing we weren't depending on taking the vaporetto to a testing site - we used the emed ones and got that hurdle covered.

My expectation is that the buses position on your map will be just to the right of the Tronchetto people mover station. If you zoom in further, at least on Google maps, there is an area labeled "Parcheggio bus turistici - sosta breve". There are some buildings with snack bars and restrooms, and a bus parking lot. I went by today on the vaporetto; we plan to take the #2 line on Saturday, get off at Tronchetto stop, and walk along to the entrance to the bus lot by the people mover station. Oh, and we didn't get specific confirmation either, just the general location and time email

I haven't been onboard to look at them, but I think those are just incorrectly drawn in some deck plans. I looked closely at some photos from drydock time, and I'm pretty sure that those four cabins are standard size veranda cabins.

English is my first language, but the chart (and many Covid policies) can still be confusing. I see it as describing a minimum time between the initial vaccination and the booster (and recognizing that there is variation in country policies). In my opinion you should be fine. If there are questions at checkin, ask for a supervisor.

I have a bus transfer to meet there in another week (Azamara cruise). I'll try to report back on how it goes. Zooming in on Tronchetto with Google maps, it looks there is a new parking area that has just been added right by the people mover. You can see it described as "Parcheggio bus turistici - sosta breve", which would be something like "tour bus parking - short stay".

It has been several years since we have been on an Azamara ship, and my memory of the level of internet functionality is rather fuzzy. We'll be on Onward shortly, and while we'd prefer to be disconnected from life back home, we may need to do some (audio-only) calls. Does this fall into the "not a chance" category, or is it at least somewhat feasible. Our backup is to try to use local cellular service in/near ports, but I'd really like to avoid the extreme rates of cruise ship cellular.

Does anyone have info on the current state of cruise docking in Venice? I know some ships/lines have moved to Ravenna or Trieste, but I'm looking specifically at what will be happening in Venice and Marghera, and if there have been changes or improvements since Fall 2021. My rough understanding is that larger ships may be docking at the VeCon container terminal in Marghera, while smaller (but still too large for Venice proper) cruises may be docking at the Fusina ferry terminal. Last fall they were still using the old Marittima terminal facility in Venice for cruise check-ins and then taking people to the ship by shuttle bus. Facilities at the actual docks seemed to be very minimal/primitive (no restrooms, taxis, public transportation). A number of cruises I'm looking at have an extra night in Venice, but with these dock locations, I'm afraid the extra night would be a waste. We would probably spend a few days in Venice before or after the cruise in any case, so the idea of having an extra night stuck out by the refinery or a bunch of idling semi's is not attractive. I'm hoping that maybe I'm being too pessimistic, though, so if anyone has real experience, or pictures, that would be great. I think Viking is supposed to have some cruises using Marghera starting in March, so that may be a source of actual experiences.