Meet me on the Equinox - Eastern Med Review

Prologue OR How we convinced Grandma to watch the kids for 2 weeks

This is my first detailed review with pictures, so go easy on me. My goal is to be entertaining and informative, not necessarily in that order.

This was the first Celebrity cruise for my wife JCS (42) and me PJS (41). We decided that we needed a real vacation (without the kids) for the first time in 3 years. We first thought about cruising in Europe after the Caribbean itineraries did not excite us too much.

Just for background, we last cruised about 3 summers ago to Alaska on Carnival using credit card points for the cruise fare and Skymiles for the air portion. Before that we cruised with our kids on Carnival out of Tampa, again using credit card points. We also had 2 prior RCI cruises in the Southern Caribbean & Bahamas, a prior Carnival cruise to the Bahamas, as well as other visits to Jamaica, Mexico, etc. either together or before we met. We have also been to Europe together a couple of times, although not since 1997.

We looked at a ton of different ships, lines and itineraries and initially settled on a Baltic cruise around Labor Day on Brilliance of The Seas. Then we looked at airfare and FF redemption possibilities for Northern Europe and couldn’t find anything that suited our dates. We put the idea on the backburner for a few weeks while work and life chugged on.

Then a friend of ours told us about her cruise a couple of years ago on Solstice in the Med and her upcoming June/July 2012 cruise on Silhouette. DW decided to have another look and emailed me with the itinerary she wanted: 9/3 from Rome to Santorini, Istanbul (2 days), Kusadasi, Athens, Mykonos and Naples. She had been all over Greece about 20 years ago, but wanted to go back and had always wanted to go to Istanbul and the Amalfi Coast, so my job was to figure out how to get us to this ship.

First the cruise – what a deal! They had Georgia resident rates for most of the categories and based on my CC research, I found one of the larger 1A hump balconies available for a great rate with a generous OBC from an online TA (OMG). I started looking at redemption possibilities on Delta: Rome – no. Florence – no. Naples, Venice, Nice, Paris, London, Brussels, Munich, Berlin, Athens – no. It looked like we were either going to more than double our price by paying airfare or scrap the whole thing. Then we looked at Amsterdam. Lookie here – 2 seats available on 9/1 and returning to Atlanta on 9/14. We would only have to connect on the way over in Boston and we could get back nonstop. Next up, look for Amsterdam to Rome flights that match up with our times. Bingo – KLM had reasonable prices for an early flight on 9/3 and a noon flight on 9/14 to sync up with our 4:30pm flight to Atlanta from Amsterdam. We also saw availability at the Amsterdam Renaissance using Marriott points for our one night in that city. So, we booked everything and bought insurance.

Now, the tricky part – asking my mother-in-law to watch the kids for 2 weeks in September.

“Mom – you know how we haven’t had a chance to take a vacation since 2009 and that I started my own business last year so we have both been working extra hard?”

“Uh, yes”

“Well, we’ve decided to go on a quick trip to Europe around Labor Day if that’s OK with you.”

“Sure honey, how long will you be gone”

“Only 14 days.”

(Spits out her coffee).

Eventually, we got her to see that it wouldn’t be too bad. The girls (10 and 13) are pretty self-sufficient and we agreed to make sure we had carpools for soccer and lacrosse practice etc. set up to make her life easier. Plus we would be gone over Labor Day when there are no activities going on and back on a Friday so only one weekend would be spent by her driving all over to various sporting events.

Moving on from the booking portion of our story, I started the actual planning (I’m the planner of the couple and JCS is the passenger). Our roll call was mildly active so I joined plus we were invited to join a Facebook group started by one of our fellow passengers. I started looking into the ports (including our extra “port” Amsterdam) and deciding on the best approach. This is where CC became my daily source for all trip-related questions. We eventually decided to DIY in Amsterdam, Istanbul, Athens, Mykonos & Santorini and book tours in Kusadasi (Ephesus) and Naples (Amalfi Coast). We quickly hooked up with a roll call group for Ephesus and for airport to port/port to airport connections in Rome. We booked AP Tours for their all day Amalfi Coast tour and then I intensively researched all the ports for Metro info, DIY touring plans, etc. I bought the Rick Steves’ Mediterranean Cruise Ports book, which is great, and also used Tom’s port guides and other free websites to obsessively plan our days in the various ports. Did we make the right choices? Stay tuned.

Drink Package – My biggest regret was not taking advantage of the 10% discount offered by Celebrity before it expired on 6/22. I had 5 days to decide and made the decision not to get anything. We were going to try and just bring on some soda with us, our 2 bottles of wine and go a la carte with our umbrella drinks and beers. JCS does not drink much – a martini or two would be enough for her. I, on the other hand, am too cheap. I look at the prices of drinks before ordering and just can’t bring myself to order the expensive one, even when on vacation. When our friends returned from their cruise on Silhouette, they raved about the drink packages and how they could try the entire Martini Bar menu. I finally broke down and got a premium package. It’s a lot of money, but I thought I would enjoy the guilt free ordering and the bottled waters, coffee, etc. JCS decided not to get any package and go a la carte, so it should be a good comparison. Stay tuned.

Money – here’s an interesting topic that gets rehashed on CC about every other day. What’s the best way to handle foreign currency for a Med cruise? We had the additional wrinkle of Turkish Lira to consider besides Euros. In the end, I applied for and received a Capital One Visa for our credit card purchases and as luck would have it, my Premier account at Wells Fargo gets me ATM withdrawals in Europe with no foreign transaction fee, just a $5 charge. That account is also not our primary checking account, so we did not have to worry about someone stealing our code/card and messing up all of our online bill payments. So, armed with the Capital One Visa and Wells Fargo ATM card in our money belts, we were ready to go overseas without a single Euro or Lira in our pockets. Would it work out OK? Stay tuned.

Finally, after our friends came back from their Silhouette cruise, they were gushing about Capri. “You have to go to Capri – use our tour operator and you can do Amalfi Coast and Capri in the same day,” they said. So, we changed our plans, cancelled the AP Tours excursion and booked with their guy. Would it work out? Stay tuned.

As the cruise got closer, I obsessed over the details. Money belts – check. Museum tickets for Amsterdam and Istanbul – check. Keyboard for the iPad I was bringing to keep tabs on work – check. Would we have the vacation of a lifetime? Stay tuned.

More to follow...

Great start. Can't wait for answers to "stay tuned."

Looking forward to more!

As we will be doing that cruise next month on the equinox I'm staying tuned! :)

As we will be doing that cruise next month on the equinox I'm staying tuned! :)[/quot

 

On the same cruise, so looking forward to lots more info please :D

I am staying tuned!! Please hurry back with the rest. I am most interested in the money situation, Great review so far! Thanks for taking the time. We take our first TA in Nov. on the equinox

We flew out on Saturday 9/1 after being dropped at the airport by my mother-in-law and our youngest, who was actually upset we were leaving. The teenager could not care less – that would change. When we checked in, JCS’ suitcase weighed in at 48lbs and mine at 36lbs, not bad for a 2 week trip.

First leg of the flight was to Boston, so we started the vacation with a Sam Adams at the Atlanta airport just to get us in the vacation mood. The flight was smooth and on-time, so we had about an hour to kill at BOS before the flight to Amsterdam and used the free wifi to Facetime with our kids. At this point, I realized I forgot my keyboard for the iPad, but at least we had our passports.

We flew over on Delta and I had upgraded us to Economy Comfort for $62 per person for this leg. We definitely enjoyed the extra recline and legroom (bulkhead), but couldn’t sleep on this flight. After a meal and a couple of movies, it landed early at 5am Amsterdam time (or 11pm EDT).

We landed and zipped through immigration and customs (sitting in row 10 gets you ahead of the rest of the plane in the immigration line) after a looong walk (the first of several on this trip) through the Amsterdam airport. We found our way to the train station after getting money at an ATM in the baggage claim area. Unfortunately, as has been stated on these boards, the train ticket machine only took coins or small bills, so we had to find a ticket booth. It cost .50 Euro more to buy a ticket this way, but E8.60 later, we were on our way to Amsterdam Centraal Station.

We got on a 5:50am train and arrived in the city around 6:15am. We then walked to the Renaissance Hotel to drop off our luggage. At least we tried to. I thought I had good walking directions from Google Maps, but unfortunately, the darkness did not allow me to see street signs clearly and we got lost a couple of times. This was of course complicated by the fact that we were dragging all our luggage at the same time.

Eventually we found the hotel and to our surprise, we were allowed to check in at 6:45am and given a room in the new wing of the hotel. Directions to our room: take the elevator to the 2nd floor, walk through the door to the new wing, get on the elevator and go up to the 3rd floor, walk around the corner and you will find your room - #929??!! Oi vey, is everything this complicated in Amsterdam? We had someone bring our luggage up and I of course had nothing smaller that 10 Euro to give him, so it was his lucky day.

We set out around 7am to explore the city. The only set items on our agenda were Anne Frank Museum tickets at 9:40am, a bike tour at 4:30pm and dinner reservations at 7:30pm. We walked around the canals and just enjoyed the peace and quiet of a Sunday morning.

We stumbled into the red light district and for curiosity’s sake, stepped into a coffeeshop. We….CENSORED…. Then we left the coffeeshop and for some reason we were extremely hungry. It was hard to find a decent restaurant open at that hour on a Sunday. We eventually found a touristy diner type place and enjoyed the Dutch specialty, pancakes.

It was then about time to head to the Anne Frank Museum and we managed to skip the line (which was long at this point) and walk into the prepaid ticket entrance. Definitely buy tickets for this online ahead of time. It was a fantastic museum because it was the actual building where the Frank family hid from the Germans for years. The layout was a one-way tour through the business portion of the building where Otto Frank ran a successful food business and then to the rear of the building where the secret attic stairs hid the family. We actually walked through twice, once to get the layout and then a second time to look at the details. It was crowded, but manageable at that time of the morning. Unfortunately, but understandably, no picture-taking is allowed in the museum.

When we left, the line was even longer. We then decided to go on a canal tour, so we walked back and purchased tickets near Centraal Station on the next canal boat that was leaving. This was a mistake. Not the canal tour itself, but sitting down for an extended period after not sleeping for 40ish hours.

We got off on a stop near the flower market and went to explore that instead. It was a neat market with lots of different varieties of flowers and plants. There were also souvenir stands. We walked and explored some more of the city and canals. By this time, it was getting busier and we noticed how many bicycles there were on every street. We soon realized that we had to be careful not to step into the bike lanes or we might get hit by the bikes, scooters and motorcycles that were constantly zipping past.

We made our way over to the Museumplein and got the obligatory “iamsterdam” picture.

We met our bike tour guide and walked over to the starting point of the tour near the Hard Rock Café. We had booked through Joy Ride Tours and there were about 12 people on the tour. We all got fitted out on our bikes and started to ride…

And that’s when the tour ended. JCS has not ridden a bike in about 20 years and it showed. She could barely wobble her way on to the bike lane. The company owner decided that she would be a menace to herself or others if she tried to keep up with the tour. He graciously offered an immediate refund and we accepted, not wanting JCS to go on an 11 day cruise with something broken or pending charges against her.

So, that put 2 hours back on our schedule. We decided to just head back to the hotel and change for dinner early. We took the canal boat back (making use of our tickets one more time) and cleaned up at the hotel. By this time, it was around 6pm and we were hungry and tired, not necessarily in that order. We figured out how to catch the tram from the hotel to near the restaurant and made it there around 6:30pm. I had booked us a table at Blue Pepper, an Indonesian restaurant. It had great reviews and 3 interesting price fixe menus.

http://www.restaurantbluepepper.com/

We chose our menu and some wine, and ate our 14 courses (small plates, mostly). It was…OK. Not worth the money (about E175 for the two of us, including a glass of wine each). We found out that the chef/owner was out sick that day, so maybe we just caught them on a bad night. After dinner, we grabbed a cab back to the hotel for E15 and tumbled into bed, exhausted, around 8:15pm. We were zonked.

The wake-up call came at 4:15am in Amsterdam. We were up in a flash (having gone to bed at 8:15pm and being excited for the cruise). We made our way to Amsterdam Centraal (knowing the way this time), bought tickets and caught the 4:50am train to Schipol Airport. Upon arrival at Schipol, we checked in at KLM for our flight to Rome and checked our bags. Then we walked to the gate, and walked, and walked some more. We eventually made it to gate D79 and waited for the flight to open so we could get seats assigned. After I walked ½ mile back to the coffee shop and stood in line for 20 minutes, we enjoyed some Dutch Caramel Waffle biscuits and coffee while we waited.

Boarding was interesting. Basically, they announced they would board by row and then everyone just bumrushed the boarding door. The gate agents didn’t seem to care and just let people board whenever.

Not having seats before paid off, because we got placed in economy comfort, just behind business class. And, check this out – they fed us on this flight, for free! Yes I know this happens all the time in Europe on a 2 hour flight, but in the States, you would be lucky to get a bag of stale pretzels and a dirty look without coughing up some cash on a flight this long.

After we boarded, I looked out for Larry & Sue from Minnesota who were on our flight and also sharing transportation to the port with us. We saw them boarding (thanks to an email with a good description of Sue’s clothing) and agreed to meet up in baggage claim at Rome.

We landed in Rome (well, Rome airport anyway) in Terminal 1 around 9:30am and went straight to baggage claim (no customs or immigration when traveling intra-EU.) We met up with Larry & Sue and walked over to Terminal 3 to meet the rest of the group. We grabbed some more Euros from an ATM on the way. No problems again.

Marianne and Bill from NJ were already waiting, but Carolyn and Phil from PA were running late. They arrived around 10:30am and we were off to Civitavecchia. Our driver from Romecabs, Salvatore, could speak very little English, but we managed to explain that we wanted to stop for wine on the way. He stopped at a highway rest stop/convenience store, which surprisingly had a decent selection of wine.

We arrived at the port a little before noon. There is really not much to see other than the castle at the entrance. It is a very busy commercial and ferry port. We pulled up right next to the Equinox and everyone piled out. I had heard that we would have to take a shuttle from the port entrance so this was a nice surprise to be dropped right at the check-in.

We went through security and filled out the health questionnaire. There was no line at this time of day. We got our SeaPass cards, had our goofy boarding picture taken and stopped to look at the dining packages. We bought the 3 dinner package without wine for $152. This included dinner for two at each of the specialty restaurants. We booked Tuscan Grill for the first sea day (and formal night), Murano for the second sea day and Silk Harvest for the final sea day (and formal night). In case you didn’t guess, we didn’t bring formal clothes.

I also noticed that where they were selling the drink packages, they had something called the Ultra Premium Package for $199 per day (not a typo) that supposedly included more of the wines, etc. that are not available in the regular Premium Package. I asked if anyone had actually bought that package and the staff member said yes, although I don’t think I believed him. I had never heard of this before. Maybe someone else has more info?

Anyhoo, we booked the dining package and walked on board – in the rain. Yes, I forgot to mention, it poured on and off driving to the port and then started again as we walked to the ship. Welcome to the sunny Mediterranean.

We went immediately to the internet café and signed up for a package. We got the $99.95 package and on the first day, you get a 15% bonus, so it amounted to around 240 minutes. The staff member was very helpful and placed a log off link on my iPad so that I would always remember to log out. He also recommended shutting off WiFi as a safeguard when not using the Internet on board.

After getting the internet sorted out, we went to check if we could get select dining as we had been waitlisted. Unfortunately, we were told that not only could we not get select, but there were no more tables for 2 available in late seating. We asked to be placed at a table for 4 near a window, which the Maitre’D was able to do.

We then walked around and explored a little bit before going up to Oceanview Café for a bite to eat. The layout of the café was confusing at first, but we got used to it. We liked the variety and selection of food. There were always some Asian dishes, Mexican food, and pizza & pasta available for lunch besides the specials of the day. I ordered my first package drink, the breakfast colada (pina colada with mango) and it was great. No paper to sign, just hand the card to the waiter and get it back with the drink.

As we were exploring the ship some more, cabins were made available around 1:30pm. Our luggage had been delivered. So, we unpacked and took a snooze until the drill at 4pm.

We were in cabin 8230, a midship hump balcony cabin.

We were assigned to muster in the Dining Room on Deck 4, which at least had plenty of seating for the drill. The drill itself consisted of some short announcements by the Cruise Director (and 4 other languages) and then a short movie about emergency procedures. I must say, I paid a little more attention this time, given that we were sitting only about an hour away from the Costa Concordia wreck.

For sailaway, we went to the Sunset Bar on Deck 15 and enjoyed some drinks and discovered the guitar/vocal stylings of Salvatore, who was to become our favorite onboard performer throughout the cruise. We chatted with some very nice English and Irish folks, who strangely enough, we did not see for the rest of the cruise at all.

After we were at sea, we took a dip in the pool and hot tub before dressing for dinner. For our first pre-dinner drinks, we went to the highly anticipated Martini Bar. It was…not so great. Both of the martinis weren’t great. Maybe we ordered wrong. Maybe we got a bad bartender.

We went to dinner and met our wait staff, Waitress Nalan from Turkey and Assistant Waiter Seker, also from Turkey. Nalan was fantastic, always had a smile and was willing to go out of her way to make us happy. Dinner on the first night was OK, not great (a consistent dining room theme). We were seated at a table for 4, by the window as requested. The other two at our table did not show up the first night.

The Sommelier came over and asked about wine. I asked for a glass, but didn’t mention the drink package. After dinner, when she asked for my card, she sort of scolded me for not telling her I had the drink package and said she would take care of me from then on. As it turned out, we would not be back in the Dining Room until night 6 of the cruise.

After dinner, we found the Molecular Bar. What a great find. If you have the drink package, you have to go there. The drinks are pricey ($12), so JCS did not partake often, but they were great. G was the bartender. This was his last cruise before his vacation, so he was in a great mood for the entire cruise. Also, he had brought his mom and brother for this trip, so we got to know them. Not sure why the Molecular Bar is not more utilized. Maybe it’s because it was added after the ship was built, so the deck plans on board don’t show it.

We then went to the casino and played a few hands of blackjack. Well, I did and JCS watched. She hates gambling herself, but enjoys watching (and backseat driving) my blackjack hands. We ended up tripling our meager budget and decided to quit while we were ahead.

That night, we moved the clocks forward one hour in preparation for Greece and Turkey. We found a movie to watch on the free on-demand library (Safe House) and watched about half of it before we fell asleep exhausted.

Up next, a sea day which includes a smoking Stromboli, a steaming soup and streaky Canadians.

This is a great review and I am looking forward to the next installment. Takes me back to last Nov when we sailed Equinox.

I was up at 6:30am, so I went out on the balcony and checked out the view.

It was Stromboli, not the cheese filled Italian specialty, but the lava-filled Italian volcano, off the coast of Sicily. We were heading into the Strait of Messina. I ran down to Café Al Bacio and picked up a latte to go.

JCS woke up when room service came around 8:00am. We finally met our cabin steward, Jose, and his giggly assistant whose name I never did get. Jose was great and very understated. He basically was invisible the whole trip and did a great job anticipating our comings and goings to clean and turn down the room.

We ate breakfast out on the balcony as the scenery rolled by. The passage lasted around an hour and was a very peaceful way to spend our first morning on board.

At 10am, we went to the CC Connections Party in the wine bar on Deck 5. (we had received an invitation the night before). They had some danishes, juice and coffee set out. There was a nice crowd of around 50 or so people. I believe that about 80 had registered online prior to the cruise. It was very nice to put some faces with names and we had a good time chatting with folks for about an hour. We were welcomed by Damien, the cruise director, and had a few senior staff there. The only one I remember was the Director of Housekeeping.

At 11:15, it was time for the Officers v. Guests ping-pong tourney while JCS decided to try zumba up on Deck 14. I was paired up with a nice guy from England who actually brought his own paddles, so the organizers pegged us as ringers from the get go. We were matched up against the reigning champs in the first round and lost a close game 11-8.

JCS and I met back up and we went to sit by the pool for a while to play Scrabble. We always managed to find a couple of shaded loungers, even at the busiest times. Either they added more loungers to this ship or people were respecting the 30 minute rule. We had lunch at the buffet, which was OK. I had planned to play in the Officer’s v. Guests pool volleyball tournament in the afternoon, but plans changed. We took a nap instead.

Around 4pm, we played Bingo. It was $30 for 6 cards and 4 games. We had a good time. The event staff on board were all young and enthusiastic, no matter the activity. There was a group of Canadians sitting together who happened to win every single game this round. The staff member calling the numbers was also Canadian, so we of course jokingly referred to the Canadian bingo conspiracy throughout the rest of the cruise whenever we saw him.

After bingo, it was time for the Molecular Bar again. We made our way through a couple more drinks on the menu in our quest to try them all. Then we changed for dinner. When we got back to the cabin, we had this friend to greet us.

Tonight was formal night and we didn’t bring any formal clothes, so we were off to Tuscan Grill. We did stop and take some pictures on Deck 4 and 5 on the way to dinner. I would say about 20-25% of the men were in tuxes and the rest in suits (other than the specialty restaurant or buffet goers.)

Tuscan Grill is uniquely situated at the rear of the ship on Deck 5 with a full view of the wake and sunset (if you are facing the right way). We booked for 7pm knowing that sunset would occur during dinner and that we were headed generally due East, so we should have a nice sunset view. We were right! We had a great view as the sun set on the Med. As for the food, it was good, but a couple of dishes were off, which detracted from the overall experience. In my humble opinion, the best dishes were the onion soup, the mac & cheese that came as a side dish with my steak and the panna cotta dessert. The steak was good, but not appreciably better than the MDR. The steak tartar appetizer that JCS ordered had the consistency of ground hamburger meat. Probably the most annoying thing was the waitress asking us to give the restaurant a good review on our comment card and trying to sell us the lunch on the next sea day. We found that tacky for a supposedly upmarket dining experience. In the end, we were glad we had the 3-meal package so the overall cost was lower. The sunset made it a worthwhile experience.

We headed to the casino and won some more hands of blackjack. We went to the first headline show of the week – Remix. And, we left after 2 cheesy songs. Not for us, and the older couple next to us from New Zealand weren’t big fans either. We went next door to Quasar for karaoke night. That was more our speed. We got up and performed “We’re Not Gonna Take It” by Twisted Sister. Most of the people who could actually sing performed ballads and slower songs. We cannot sing at all, so we generally pick fun, party-type songs. We ran into a couple of CC friends and had a lot of fun. It’s a shame Celebrity doesn’t do karaoke every night. From what I can tell, it was the only time anyone was ever in Quasar.

Around 11, we were getting a little tired of the slower songs so we left and went to watch the rest of Safe House in our cabin. We fell asleep at 1am knowing we had another late morning ahead of us.

Up next, 8-legged octopi, 5-legged windmills and 4-legged cats.

Great review, keep it coming!!

We also booked the same exact itinerary for next May. Hoping my mother in law would watch our then 7 yr old son (only child). So I can completely relate to your story. He typically goes with us on our vacations and though we have taken our son to Euripe before but he was much younger (it was the Baltuc cruise), at this age it would be very hard for him to appreciate and enjoy the sites and we would not enjoy the trip either with him asking to go back to the kids club in the middle of a tour. So we decided that he is staying home for this one.

Excellent review! We are thinking about this itinerary but on the Reflection next May so I'm reading everything I can find about it.

I love all your pictures, especially you asleep on the boat in Amsterdam, totally something I'd do. Can't wait to see the rest.

Enjoying your detailed review-

We had Nalan on our Equinox cruise and our group of 8 loved her! In fact my BIL aka TAS3086, who's been on 40 some cruises, wrote a letter to Celeb extolling her service as the best he'd experienced.

Love the sunset picture. We went to Tuscan twice on Equinox. The first visit was wonderful, the second, we sent back the steak. I agree that mac and cheese is to die for.

It is truly a great cruise review, very interesting and informative.

We have the same cruise itinerary. Used Delta 90,000 FF miles/each for Atlanta to Rome round-trip air.

I will definitely follow this wonderful review. Specially pay attention to each port on your DIY.

Thanks for taking the time to do such an indepth review with photos. We are on the Equinox next June so I am interested on hearing your thoughts on the tours and ports. Looking forward to more. :)

Spectacular sunset picture.............

Wednesday morning. Curtains closed. Cabin dark. Woke up and looked at the clock. 9:20. 9:20!! Wow – Don’t think we both have slept this late in years. Quickly got up, grabbed a Caramel Macchiato from Bacio.

Next we went to the Shore Excursion desk (the one and only time we visited on this cruise) and bought bus tickets for Mykonos from the port to the town. They were $8 for round trip (or unlimited actually) transportation. Not a bad deal to save walking 30 minutes on a road with no sidewalk and crazy scooter drivers.

We raced up to catch the buffet before the good stuff was taken away at 10am. The breakfast buffet was consistently good on this ship. They had omelet stations every day, a daily variety of pancakes and French toast (coconut, banana, choc chip, etc.). There was also the full English (tomatoes, black pudding, real sausages, etc.). Because this ship does not use trays, waiters were also usually quick to offer coffee or tea when you sat down, so you didn’t have to get up again to grab a drink.

Next up was the gym. I used the bike and JCS went on the treadmill. It was busy, but not crowded. JCS took a snooze after that and I explored the rest of the ship. I checked out the Sky lounge and the solstice deck way up top. The pool was packed, although there were still a few loungers to be had.

I sat on the balcony reading as we approached Mykonos. We had no real plan for the day other than to take the bus into town and walk around. We are not really beach people, and since we were in port late anyway (2pm-10pm), we decided to just wing it.

As would be a common theme throughout this cruise, we reached port early, around 1:30pm. As would also be another common theme, JCS and I were the first ones off the ship. We grabbed the bus into the old port and then walked to town. (A good overview of this route can be found in Tom’s port guides). We walked around, shopped and enjoyed the sights and smells of Mykonos.

We shared a snack lunch in the square around 3pm (still full from a big breakfast) of grilled octopus, fresh bread, fried cheese and Greek beer (Mythos). Only 35 Euros with tip, a bargain at half the price. When we were finishing up lunch, a couple of cats walked up along a ledge next to our table. We didn’t have any scraps for them, but the group next to us treated them to some calamari and bread.

Next we had some gelato near the old port and used the Internet to check in with work and home. FYI – there is no free WiFi at the dock in Mykonos because it is too far from town.

We split up at this point for an hour so JCS could continue to shop and I could go check out the windmills and churches. It seemed like there was literally a church on every corner in Mykonos. Some of them were really beautiful with the stark white plaster against the blue sky.

Who's the guy sleeping one off on the windmill?

We also ran into the island mascot, Petros.

We took the bus back around 6pm and went to the pool. It was nice and quiet at that time because everyone was either at dinner or still on the island. We just read books, relaxed and enjoyed the island views. The dinner menu looked bad (sorry, don’t remember what it was) and we decided to eat at the buffet instead. We had sushi and Indian food.

That night we went to the show – it was a comedian/juggler. He was pretty good, although he had a cold, so he kept coughing and spluttering during the show which was annoying. After the show, we played blankety-blank (which is just the English name for The Match Game). It was an adults-only game, so the answers were nice and raunchy. We went to the casino for a little while but gave back some winnings, so we turned in. We started watching the movie, “A Separation” and then fell asleep.

Up next: Two bistros, a lobster and a volleyball

Thank you for your reviews and pictures.

Fabulous.

Will be on this ship and itinerary in one week.

Can't wait.

Holly

Thanks for the details. We are arriving in 1 week! Looking for excursion suggestions.

This is great! We are going on this cruise in November. Your descriptions are making this sound so great :-)

Great review..........sounds like you and your wife are "easy" travelers. Nothing is going to ruin my vacation types. Loved your comment about the "coffee house" in Amsterdam. Our same experience! You must have missed the touristy souvenir shops with the "adult" aisle, right next to the post cards and t-Shirts! Made me blush!

Looking forward to the rest of your review. We are mostly Princess cruisers but leaning toward trying Celebrity. We traveled with the world famous Tom of Tom's Port Guides. A great fellow and for those of us that are not world travels his guides are a tremendous help!

Thanks for your review!

Excellent review.

Keith

Looking forward to the rest of your review.

Thank you. Great review.

I stay tuned....