BrianC-80

One further thing to add is to say - make sure you book the train tickets in advance - it'll be far cheaper. http://www.nationalrail.co.uk/ will give you ticket prices and the timetable, although may link you to the individual train provider rather than directly through the site when you try to book.

Our flight will arrive early Saturday morning next June. Our cruise leaves on Sunday..upon arrival we would like to see Stonehenge on our way to Southampton, where we will spend the night before boarding our ship...what is the easiest option that includes tickets? Thanks!

You'll want to make your way to London Waterloo - easiest way is to jump on the Piccadilly and change in town. The Bakerloo line isn't calling at Paddington right now, so that route isn't as convenient as it normally is.

Once there, you can get a train from Waterloo to Salisbury. Takes about an hour and a half. There you'll jump on the Stonehenge bus (exit the station and turn left, and it stops about 50 yards away) which takes you to and from the site. Then return to Salisbury (I recommend visiting the Cathedral while you're there) then you'll catch a train to Southampton. This one takes about half an hour.

Hi Brian, thank you for your appreciation. Over the past six years I have put a lot of time and effort into the web site and researching the correct answers to questions but maybe it is time I retired and let someone else take over:rolleyes:

 

It is the perfect plan and of course the 9:07 is the one to take when your ship arrives early enough. I only mentioned the 11:07 to the OP as the earliest possible because they are with Celebrity who mostly do not dock before 9:30.

 

From either station it is an easy, interesting walk to the centre, Wismar a bit closer than Schwerin. My web page on each town gives detailed routes.

 

In Schwerin if you finish your visit in the town centre, Marienplatz, the #1 tram will take you back to the station, only two stops. There are ticket machines on the tram, the ticket you require is a Kurzstreke (short journey) and the fare is 1.50 euro.

 

I travel on DB all the time, I do not have a car, and find that the delays are mostly on the long distance trains although no worse than UK. I make the journey between Rostock and Schwerin regularly and have never had more than a few minutes delay except in very bad winter weather. In any case it is a good idea to get back to Warnemunde in time to have a walk around this lovely little town.

 

Happy cruising :)

Anni

http://www.travelanni.webs.com

Thanks Anni, much appreciated!

I might recommend that Bæjarins Beztu Pylsur hot dog carts in Reykjavík. When we were there several years ago (not on a cruise ship) we had a couple of hot dogs from there and they're quite delicious. Also good enough for Bill Clinton. Back in 2006 they were voted the best hot dog stands in Europe.

The only thing I would recommend not eating in Iceland is hákarl. I smelt it there and that was good enough for me - it's rotten fermented shark.

Anni,

Thanks for all your advice on this thread, it's been so valuable to someone like us who are planning a trip to the area. I was wondering if I could run my little plan past you to make sure I haven't inadvertently worked out something silly. The plan is to visit Schwerin, and then come back and spend some time in Warnemunde (it's our first visit to the area).

We're going to be in Warnemunde on the Norwegian Star from 7:30am to 10pm, so a nice long day. However we're the type of folks that like to get out early and then come back and laze around the ship (or at least wander around near to the port and then laze around the ship!).

So noting that the Mecklenburg lander card won't work before 9am (we're there on Wednesday 25th May) but there's a direct train from Rostock to Schwerin at 9:07. So my idea is to buy a separate one way ticket each for a couple of Euros to take us from Warnemunde to Rostock in time to catch the 9:07, and then use the lander card for the rest of the day?

Does that sound feasible? I figure that way we'll make up two hours by not having to wait till the 11:07, which seems worth it for less than 5 euros.

Also depending on the weather on the day, we might decide to visit Schwerin for a couple of hours and then head onto Wismar before going back to the ship since we're only going to be about half an hour away by train from there while at Schwerin. Are both towns easily walkable from the train stations, or will we need to hop on a bus/tram at the other end of each?

Thanks!

Brian

Just gone under 30 days for us - which is a little misleading as we're going to Copenhagen three days ahead of the cruise, so it'll sneak up on us!

Can't wait - a cruise to St Petersburg was our bucketlist cruise when we first started cruising, and we've just spent best part of 18 months saving up for it. Old style unlimited dining package and the drinks package too. Considering that it seems to be refusing to warm up in London, it can't come soon enough.

So this is kinda a dead horse, but for men, what is the deal with closed toe shoes?

 

I was planning on light linen pants and a polo, with my Birkies...Perfect outfit, however, I have searched the forums and some people say ok, some are like no way, I have no problems with the pants, its the shoes...

 

I imagine there are two dining rooms, (going on the Dawn) and one is more formal than the other I am guessing, thus the reason for the varied opinions.

 

I am thinking guys get the short end of the stick on this, and may need to pack some closed (like all the way) shoes vs the sandals I had planned on.

 

Thanks for any opinions, read the NCL site and they are just a vague. Smart casual...

While you're right, one dining room is invariably more formal than the other, part of the free style cruising ethos is that you can be as formal as you like. But if you want to opt for some closed toe shoes but keep the resort/holiday vibe (and despite the fact that I'm the last person who should give out fashion advice) then perhaps you might want to opt for some sort of canvas deck shoe?

They'll be as light weight as your sandals, and fairly airy. In fact you might end up wearing them elsewhere as a sandal alternative.

Certainly when I went on my last NCL cruise I didn't take a pair of black leather shoes, and I don't plan to on my next cruise either. I think I wore dark brown walking boots in the dining rooms the last time, although that was winter in the Med so I might have to think about some sort of deck shoe related solution for the next one myself.

For those that didn't see the news today: http://www.travelweekly.co.uk/articles/61395/norwegian-cruise-line-makes-cuba-sailings-bid

Del Rio made the announcement that he was seeking to take Oceania into Cuba towards the end of the year and then both Seven Seas and NCL shortly afterwards.

Now while that might not seem all that impressive to Europeans who get to go there anyway, it'll be a major step for Americans as the restrictions from travelling to Cuba relax greatly.

So shall we start speculating? Can we expect to see Cuba stops on NCL Caribbean cruises from autumn 2017? How much would be too much to pay? And more importantly - is there an urgency to get there early before Cuba "changes" or is it better to wait for the infrastructure to improve to match over Caribbean stops?

Interested to hear people's thoughts.

Just hoping they get their act in gear before the London Cruise Show at the end of February as we were planning on booking our spring 2017 cruise then. Mind you, the single Eastern Med cruise already released for April 2017 is very reasonably priced and going to locations we're interested in. So it might be that anyway.

We stayed in an aft facing suite on the Jade a couple of years ago, so I can't speak for the balcony size as it'll have been different but it certainly sold us on the aft facing balcony business. The major plus is that you always get a private view of the sail away every single time no matter what side the ship is docked on.

You still get a breeze, but having been on a side balcony before, I can say that it isn't as strong.

Loving the review so far, really helpful! I've already taken notes on the car service from Barcelona airport. We too are No.1 Traveller addicts - we usually end up in the cinema room at the Heathrow one.

We've unexpected ended up with an Epic cruise after a competition win (still waiting to find out exactly where and when with dates etc) but I'm really enjoying finding out all the little ins and outs of the ship with this review.

It is a shame to lose Istanbul, I loved it when I overnighted on the Jade about a year and a week ago. Thanks to the previous poster mentioning the cistern - good memories! We had someone in our group who had previously been there when they rowed people around before the walkways were built!

But in all fairness, the new itinerary does make me want to book this one quite a bit (especially for that deal). I'll have to mull it over Christmas and discuss with the other half. With the exception of Venice, we haven't been to any of the ports on that cruise now.

We were on the Jade last December - loved her and would sail again on her in a heartbeat.

We managed to get a last minute upgrade and so because we ended up in a suite we could dine in Cagney's at lunch - we didn't go there in the evening but the truffle fries are to die for.

The one speciality restaurant we did cough up for was the Teppenyaki and that was one of the most fun (and delicious) meals I've had anywhere, never mind on a cruise ship.

It's a good ship, and I'm sure you'll have a good time no matter where you eat. We've got the unlimited dining on our cruise on the Star next May and are looking forward to using it for the first time as well.

We were on the Jade last December doing the Eastern Med - we had perfect weather the entire time (bright but jackets required for warmth). Absolutely no rain at all.

We only noticed the movement of the sea on one day - the rest of the time we could have been sailing across a lake. But this was because we'd managed to luck out and avoid any bad weather.

The Christmas stuff hard started going up before we go onboard and while we were there they started putting out these huge (fake) gingerbread houses.

We were on the Jade last December. Some of the stuff they don't list but is about includes an oversized chess and draughts sets on the promenade.

The kids club seemed to be very good - basically we never saw any kids about during the day when we were at sea because they were all in the club!

Although we didn't do it on the Jade, one of the most fun things we've done previously on a cruise was a scavenger hunt, and that had both adults and kids playing. It was a great deal of fun (although someone did turn up with an entire hand sanitiser stand).

We went to Venice last year (not on a cruise mind you). I highly recommend the Doge's Palace if you haven't already been. It's right at St Marks Square, and is utterly breathtaking once you go up into the Doge's apartments.

I don't think it'd be something too unusual and certainly some sort of pasta with a mariana sauce is likely to turn up at some point on the cruise. I can't remember if it was on the menu when we sailed back in December (we didn't take records of the standard bit of the daily menu, and only have one set of photos of the daily changing part of the menu. But I had a look at an older NCL main dining room menu on the Jewel and they had spaghetti with mariana sauce as a standard thing on the daily menu.

Thanks for posting! My wife and I are heading that way next week for an Eastern Med cruise and are looking forward to those stops. I hadn't realised quite how well preserved Ephasus was.

The wife and I went to Venice earlier in the year for three days and really enjoyed ourselves - it was the final weekend of Carnivale and was just amazing (if it wasn't for the rain - on the last day we had to take some very odd walking paths on the main island to avoid the flooding).

We stayed out on Guidecca at the Hilton, which was really handy for the shuttle service straight to and from St Marks, and was pretty convenient for the ACTV shuttle bus/vapporetto combo to get to and from the airport.

I'd heavily recommend visiting the Doges Palace - it was my favourite thing in the city and when we return to Venice, I'm sure I'll go there again - I enjoyed it that much.

We went out to Murano and Burano, and while I really enjoyed Murano, I just don't think the travel time (and the extremely cramped vapporettos between the islands) make the journey from Murano to Burano worth it on a short stay. Getting all the way out there, walking around both islands and coming back ate up an entire day for us whereas I think you could comfortably do Murano in the morning (especially if you didn't stay out on Guidecca like we did!).

But Venice is like no where else, it's a really magical place and I'm sure like me, once you go, you'll want to go back immediately.

I think it depends on the season - when we were there for carnival earlier in the year we had a plug in deterrant in the hotel room where we stayed - but despite the flooding (oh the acqua alta!) we didn't have any problems. I imagine it was too cold at the time for them.

We are flying into London on August 30, the day before our cruise, and trying to figure out the best plan to take advantage of our day. We are a group of 4 adults + 1 toddler 19 months). Does anyone have recommendations for good toddler activities in London, Southampton or in between?

This is a really good website for places in the UK to take kids (I'll show the specific London url): http://www.dayoutwiththekids.co.uk/things-to-do/London

Slight hijacking of the thread as I pass the Intercontinental at Westminster on my way to work each day. If you get a chance try the fish and chip shop down Strutton Ground nearby (The Laughing Halibut) and if you want to try a real proper British cafe, then head down to The Regency - probably about a five to ten minute walk down at Regency Street nearby.

Anyway, I'm not sure of the timings but you won't be far from Victoria Coach Station and there will be National Express coaches from there to Heathrow. Alternatively you can get a cab to Paddington Station and get the Heathrow Express (or the cheaper and slower Heathrow Connect) to the airport. However I'm not sure what hour they start in the morning.

Alternatively if you do decide to do the tube route then you're actually very well located for it. The Intercontinental is opposite St James Park underground station. If you go that way, be warned there are probably about twenty steps down at this station. But if you get the westbound District line towards either Richmond or Ealing then stay on it until Baron's Court because if you change there then you won't have to lug your luggage up and down more steps. You just stay on the same platform but walk to the other side for the Piccadilly line to Heathrow. This will be significantly slower than other choices as both the District and Piccadilly have a lot of stations.

Looks just beautiful there! Very much reminds me of Norway in the spring but thankfully much flatter! :)

We generally found the ones on the higher decks to be far less used than the ones down in the bowels of the ship. In fact only once did we have to wait at all for a washing machine to finish.

Hope it all goes well! We're sailing on her in December - it'll be the first time we've travelled to more than one country in a cruise so we'll be doing a currency dance as well. :)