Honeymoon/Aqua Class Report on the Equinox Oct 31 Eastern Med. Cruise - with pictures

[kat228]

We just returned from a fantastic cruise on the Equinox. We did the 7-day Eastern Mediterranean that left on October 31 out of Civitavecchia.

 

A little about us: I’m 26 and my new husband is 27. We got married on October 29, so this cruise was for our honeymoon. We have both cruised before, the latest being in ’09 on the Carnival Liberty out of Tampa. This was our first cruise with Celebrity.

 

I’ll be doing a day by day break-down of our trip, including the three days in Rome afterwards.

 

Now, the standard advice is to fly in at least a day early to ensure you make the cruise. We did just that on our last cruise, but for this one, since the wedding was the 29th, we had no other option than to leave on the 30th to fly overnight and get in on the 31st. We will never chance that again. We had quite the ordeal with Delta that I’ve written out here:

Long story short, we will never fly Delta again.

We wound up on a later flight than originally scheduled, which got us into Rome at noon instead of 8am. Our arrangement was a private transfer with RomeCabs, so we contacted them as soon as we knew of the change via email. They were there waiting for us! We arrived at the port around 1pm. Boarding had already begun and it maybe took us 5 minutes to go through everything. Our room was ready when we got on the ship, so we went and dropped off our carry-ons and took a few pictures!

 

We were in Aqua Class cabin 1606 (thanks to CC I knew about the extended balcony!)

 

Welcome Sparkling Wine & Fruit:

 

Ice Tea & Water, the water was replaced every day even if you didn’t use it.

 

 

Extended Balcony (hump cabin)

 

Geoff relaxing after finally making it!

 

I’ll have more cabin photos in the next post. But one of the first things we did was figure out how to get online to let our parents know that we were on board! After our

flight problems, we knew that they’d sleep better knowing we were online. Thanks to CC again, we knew about making sure to log-off after we used it for a bit! Since we only needed to shoot off that one email, we just used it per minute.

Edited November 13, 2011 by kat228

[kat228]

Some more cabin pictures

 

Closet:

 

Bathroom:

 

Shower (with bar to rest your foot on so you can shave easier…ingenious!)

 

Amenities

 

Once that was done, we decided to head up to the Buffet for lunch and do a little exploring.

 

Our cabin was located really close to the main elevators, so it was a very convenient location.

 

We made it up to the buffet, which was crowded, but open enough that it was easy to get around.

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I grabbed some pumpkin soup (delicious!) and just an egg salad sandwich

 

We grabbed a few sweets too

 

After we grabbed some lunch, we went and explored the ship.

 

Pool area:

 

Adult only…the only actually crowded pool area during the cruise since it was so chilly:

 

Spa area:

 

And the center of the ship:

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We headed back to our cabin where we found our bags, so we decided to unpack before muster. Muster was a much better experience than Carnival. On Carnival you didn’t need the life-jackets (same as Celebrity) but everyone went to the deck where the life-boats were, so there were a lot of people standing on top of each other. At Celebrity, you were assigned to a part of the ship. We were assigned to the upper-level MDR. We enjoyed it simply because we wouldn’t be spending too much time in it. Since we were early, we took some photos while we waited.

 

Wine Tower:

 

Set table:

 

Once Muster was over, we did a little more exploring.

 

Theater:

 

Martini Bar:

 

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We stopped at some of the specialty restaurants

 

 

Murano:

 

Silk Harvest:

 

Tuscan Grille:

 

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Next it was time for Sail Away!

 

 

 

 

We were pretty tired, so we decided to head up to dinner pretty early. It was nice having Select Dining with Blu where we could head up at any time we were hungry.

 

Inside:

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I tried my best to take food pictures of everything! I’ll just say as a blanket statement that the food at Blu was excellent.

 

Geoff started with the quail.

 

I had the Blu Cheese Soufflé, which was excellent. Very mild.

 

Geoff had the sweet corn soup

 

I had the tomato & mozzarella salad. It was good, but the tomatoes were hard to eat, they kept squirting across the plate!

 

I had the filet. It was cooked perfectly and was super tender. The white stuff on the plate was a celery root puree. It was like adding butter to the steak, so good!

 

Geoff had the ahi tuna, which he enjoyed, but it was a little spicy.

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Dessert time!

I had the gingersnap basket

And Geoff had the coconut crème brulee.

Day 2: Sea Day

We woke up to a view of Sicily as we passed through the Straights of Messina.

 

 

 

With the stress of the wedding and then the flight fiasco, we were exhausted. We slept in pretty late and missed the start of our Cruise Connections because we were grabbing breakfast! Sorry everyone! So we decided to go to the Galley Tour.

 

 

 

The Galley Tour was really interesting. I was actually expecting it to be bigger, but it was highly efficient.

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Our next stop was the Glass demonstration. We thought it was really neat and anytime a show was going on and we weren’t up to anything, we’d go check it out.

 

 

We decided to head to Bistro on 5 for a late lunch and started with Caesar salads (at the urging of our waiter.)

 

I had the Tuscan Sun, which had artichokes and sun dried tomatoes

 

Geoff had the Sweet and Sour with sirloin.

 

For dessert, I had the nutella & banana.

 

Geoff had the Grand Marnier and orange peel.

 

I’m really glad we got to try Bistro on 5. It was really excellent and worth the extra little cost. I would encourage everyone to check it out!

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Ready for more food?

 

We had a pretty lazy and relaxing afternoon before finally deciding to go for dinner. It was formal night, so we got all prettied up and headed out to Blu!

 

Geoff started with the macadamia nut encrusted scallops.

 

I saw that they had a crab and mushroom risotto as an entrée, so I asked if I could get it as a starter. I could! But I’m fairly certain it was the entrée portion, so I didn’t come close to eating It all!

 

I then continued my crab theme and had the crab bisque.

 

And Geoff had the gazpacho. He wasn’t a huge fan of it…later in the cruise we discovered he’s just not a fan of cold soups.

 

If there was a game bird on the menu, Geoff ordered it. Tonight’s option was the pheasant. He was warned by our waiter that it was going to be tough…which was correct, but it had great flavor.

 

I had the lamb. It was cooked great and came with lamb shoulder that was so tender and flavorful, just excellent.

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We both got the same dessert, the chocolate floating island.

 

 

We asked the maître-d to take our picture since we were all dressed up.

 

 

Then we grabbed an after-dinner drink at one of the bars on board. Geoff had port and I had Sambuca.

 

 

 

This little guy was waiting for us when we got back to the cabin.

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Day 3: Santorini

 

We weren’t pulling into Santorini until 1pm, so we had another leisurely morning. This time we were up early enough to grab breakfast in Blu.

 

I just had some eggs over easy

 

And Geoff had some vanilla pancakes. He was happy to have real syrup.

 

Santorini:

 

This was our only tender port. It took forever to get off the ship. It was almost 2 and we were tender ticket number 12… so that was frustrating.

 

This was also the only port that we had an independent tour booked instead of one through the ship. We were going on a Santorini Wine Tour. Through this company: http://www.santoriniwinetour.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=47&Itemid=53

 

We couldn’t find the van, but I had their phone number, so I was able to give them a call and we were able to hook up. So definitely make sure you have any phone numbers for the tours you take!

 

First winery:

 

Our tasting set up:

 

And the wines we tasted:

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On our way to the second winery, we stopped and looked at some vines. They grow in baskets instead of the way they grow here. It protects the grapes from the harsh sun and wind.

 

 

 

These are the wines we tried at the second winery.

 

 

 

Our wine tour was fantastic. I would definitely recommend it! Just make sure you’re the first tender!

 

This was after we got back to Fira:

 

 

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The line for the cable car to go down was really long, so we decided to walk. Bad decision. It was a long, long, long way down filled with Donkey poop. The guys who handled the donkeys were trying to get people to pay to walk down too…note: you don’t need to pay just to walk down, only if they carry you on a Donkey. The couple in front of us was being harassed about it and eventually gave in.

 

This was the view from the top:

 

Fira:

 

Down…down…down…

 

Dinner time!

 

Tonight at Blu Geoff had the mushroom napoleon.

 

I had almond encrusted baked brie.

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Geoff had the Plantain Corn Soup. It was a little spicy.

 

Escargot was always an option, which I’m a sucker for.

 

I had the braised short ribs which were tender and delicious

 

The game bird du jour was squab, so of course that’s what Geoff had.

 

Geoff had the passion fruit cake for dessert:

 

I had the chocolate biscuit. I won the dessert round.

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Day 4: Kusadasi

We decided to try the main dining room for breakfast. It was not as good as Blu. But decent.

 

I just had some French toast and yogurt:

 

Geoff had eggs benedict. His favorite. The yolks were a little over-done, but had good flavor.

 

View from the Balcony:

 

The tour we decided on today was highlights of Ephesus with lunch, through Celebrity. It was excellent.

 

We started at the House of the Virgin Mary, which was very spiritual.

 

 

The spring had healing powers if you drank it.

 

 

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From there we headed to Ancient Ephesus. It was quite the awesome town.

 

The goddess Nike

 

The main shopping street:

 

The Library:

 

The Amphitheatre, that has been used by modern stars.

 

Reenactment:

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Afterwards, we headed to a resort to have lunch. It was right in Kusadasi along the water. It was gorgeous.

 

Lunch was in the form of a buffet, all traditional Turkish foods (and spaghetti…)

 

 

Our desserts. The Baklava was excellent.

 

Our ship:

 

Kusadasi at night:

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Before dinner tonight we grabbed a drink at the Ensemble Lounge.

 

 

Carpaccio:

 

Crab salad (sorry, the ship was moving a bit.)

 

I then had the arugula salad. It was excellent.

 

This is the red bell pepper soup that Geoff had. Again, it was a little spicy.

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I had the rigatoni for my entrée. It was the only dish at Blu that I was disappointed in. It wasn’t bad, it just wasn’t great.

 

And tonight’s game bird is duck. Duck is Geoff’s favorite. This one was his favorite.

 

Dessert was No Sugar Added Coffee Crème Brulee.

 

Geoff had the Coconut & Chocolate cake.

 

 

Day 5: Athens

 

When we pulled in to Piraeus, we were able to see the sunrise!

 

 

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We headed back to Blu that morning for breakfast.

 

We started with chocolate croissants.

 

Today Geoff had Blu-berry and pecan pancakes.

 

I had the parfait, which I thought was made with granola actually had museli, which I’m not crazy about.

 

 

Today’s tour was Athens Sightseeing and the Acropolis. The tour wasn’t that great. We saw what it said, but the guide was less than great. We also weren’t that enamored with Athens, so all in all, this was our least favorite port.

 

This was a temple we saw looking down from the Acropolis.

 

Looking down over Athens:

 

The Parthenon:

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More pictures around the Acropolis:

 

 

 

The sightseeing part of the tour was on the bus that just went through Athens and pointed out some sights…just really around a block or two.

 

This was the square where all the protests were taking place:

 

There was an optional drop off at the Plaka for shopping, but we didn’t take it.

 

We caught the sunset off the balcony that night:

 

 

[kat228]

The night of our Athens day we had booked Murano. Overall, we liked Murano, but it took a while for our waiter to loosen up a bit. They were very uptight. I can’t drink red wine, so I asked the sommelier to recommend a white wine to eat with steak. When I wasn’t going to pair everything with wine, he seemed a little short. But it didn’t ruin our overall experience.

 

We both started with duck pate as it was the taste to start.

 

I had the mushroom risotto to start, which was tasty, but I’m really not a fan of foam on my food.

 

Geoff had the foie gras.

 

I had the three tenderloins which were delicious. They were full of flavor and so tender. Cooked perfectly too.

 

Geoff had the duck. Who’s surprised?

 

 

Next was the cheese course. They brought a tray over for us to choose what we wanted.

 

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For dessert Geoff had the Strawberry Balsamic Crepe. It was made table side.

 

 

I had the dark chocolate soufflé. I love soufflés, so this was a treat!

 

 

We were given a tray of candies at the end of the meal.

 

 

 

All in all, we enjoyed Murano, but we weren’t in love with it. The food was good, but the food at Blu was just as good, so if we stayed Aqua Class again, I’m not sure I would feel the need to eat in Murano.

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Day 6: Sea Day #2

We started today with breakfast on the balcony.

 

We caught the Top Chef like competition. It was really a lot of fun.

 

 

That afternoon we had signed up for the tea at Murano. I love high teas, so this was great.

 

 

We opted to go with the champagne.

 

These were the accompaniments for the tea

 

And the sandwiches and pastries. They came around with extras of anything you wanted.

 

 

I’m glad we went to the tea, it was really excellent.