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Yet another 5/11/12 Equinox Mediterranean review! :)

Shooraq

By Shooraq,
in Celebrity Cruises

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May B Great Review Rare

May B

Posted
Posted

Lois, I loved your review, too! It's especially fun to hear of somebody's first experience -- and how you were so thrilled with Europe! If perchance you are a bridge player, I hope you'll consider playing in the Jacksonville Regional in August. I'd love to meet you and talk about cruising and about CC.com.

 

There was a third gal on your cruise who also did a review, and I enjoyed hers, too. All three of you helped me get ready for my own cruise, which was every bit as wonderful as you all had. Thank you!

 

--May

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emcee207

emcee207

Posted
Posted

Robin,

 

Great review, great pics. I just spent an hour an a half reading it and all the posts. Nice Job.

 

I see you are from Waltham, we are in Milton.

 

We did our best cruise back in 2008, a 14 day "Best of Italy" cruise on the Azamara Quest, the only non Celebrity cruise we've taken, although it is a "sister" line.

 

Couple of thoughts;

 

We took Swiss Intl airlines from Boston to Zurich and then just one hour to Rome. It was fantastic! Gorgeous brand new plane, the food was the best we ever had on a plane (real china and silverware), free liquor, etc. I kept pinching myself. Not sure if they still do that route but if you go to Rome again be sure to check it out. Not the cheapest, we paid $1035 per person round trip but WELL worth it.

 

Had to chuckle about your DH's fear of heights. My wife has the same problem and one definitely has to figure that in when booking tours, etc. LOL, just ask LoisR who experienced my wife freaking out on a tour in the Carribean several years ago. Lois, if you are reading this hope you can laugh about that now.

 

We used RomeInLimo for tours in Rome and airport transportation. Duman and his crew are the best!

 

We also want to get back to Italy for a land based vacation. Hey, want to share a villa in Tuscany for a week?????

 

We stayed four days in Rome before our cruise. Stayed in Pantheon Square at the Albergo De Senato. Pricey but our room looked out over Pantheon Square and was breathtaking.

 

I was interested in your experiences and comments regarding booking/planning private tours. We had a couple of bad experiences on our cruise by trusting other people, actually people we met here on CC. I vowed then and there never to trust anyone else and I book my own tours. If I have others interested to keep costs down I keep it to no more than 8 people. Any more than that is just unmanageable and will be prone to failure.

 

We used the "Ports of Call" section on these boards to investigate and book all the private tours we took.

 

Again, nice job on the review!

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Lois R Great Review Rare

Lois R

Posted
Posted
Lois, I loved your review, too! It's especially fun to hear of somebody's first experience -- and how you were so thrilled with Europe! If perchance you are a bridge player, I hope you'll consider playing in the Jacksonville Regional in August. I'd love to meet you and talk about cruising and about CC.com.

 

There was a third gal on your cruise who also did a review, and I enjoyed hers, too. All three of you helped me get ready for my own cruise, which was every bit as wonderful as you all had. Thank you!

 

--May

 

Hi May, thanks:)....the other review was from our cruisemate named

Jill. (Her screen name is Sooper).

 

As for bridge? Never played the game so will miss you. If you play

for money? Hope you win lots of it:D;):)

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May B Great Review Rare

May B

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Posted

... and we play for masterpoints. But thanks for the good wishes.

 

Yes, of course it was Jill, now I remember, vividly. You three weren't the only three thrilled cruisers on your ship, but you are the ones who kept us here at CC.com enthralled, and we thank you.

 

--May

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Shooraq

Shooraq

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Robin,

 

Great review, great pics. I just spent an hour an a half reading it and all the posts. Nice Job.

 

I see you are from Waltham, we are in Milton.

 

We did our best cruise back in 2008, a 14 day "Best of Italy" cruise on the Azamara Quest, the only non Celebrity cruise we've taken, although it is a "sister" line.

 

Couple of thoughts;

 

We took Swiss Intl airlines from Boston to Zurich and then just one hour to Rome. It was fantastic! Gorgeous brand new plane, the food was the best we ever had on a plane (real china and silverware), free liquor, etc. I kept pinching myself. Not sure if they still do that route but if you go to Rome again be sure to check it out. Not the cheapest, we paid $1035 per person round trip but WELL worth it.

 

Had to chuckle about your DH's fear of heights. My wife has the same problem and one definitely has to figure that in when booking tours, etc. LOL, just ask LoisR who experienced my wife freaking out on a tour in the Carribean several years ago. Lois, if you are reading this hope you can laugh about that now.

 

We used RomeInLimo for tours in Rome and airport transportation. Duman and his crew are the best!

 

We also want to get back to Italy for a land based vacation. Hey, want to share a villa in Tuscany for a week?????

 

We stayed four days in Rome before our cruise. Stayed in Pantheon Square at the Albergo De Senato. Pricey but our room looked out over Pantheon Square and was breathtaking.

 

I was interested in your experiences and comments regarding booking/planning private tours. We had a couple of bad experiences on our cruise by trusting other people, actually people we met here on CC. I vowed then and there never to trust anyone else and I book my own tours. If I have others interested to keep costs down I keep it to no more than 8 people. Any more than that is just unmanageable and will be prone to failure.

 

We used the "Ports of Call" section on these boards to investigate and book all the private tours we took.

 

Again, nice job on the review!

 

I've done Swiss before to visit my friend in Basel. What a surprisingly nice airline! I would definitely use them again. I almost did this trip, but the hours of the US Airways flight were a little better in order to enjoy the afternoon flying into Rome to see the Vatican. I will better consider Swiss next time when I fly into Europe.

 

Trust me, I understabnd the challenges of tours backfiring on you. I have not had any major issues yet, but have witnessed people oversleeping or miscommunication or illness having people back out at the last minute. going forward, I might limit the number of larger group tours I organize. Running 16-20 person vans is a lot of work! For my british isles cruise, only one tour is 14 people. The remainder range from 4 person taxis to an 8 person van. Keeping the numbers to 10-12 maximum definitely keeps things eaiser to manage. Also, I will try to have a few more DIY or HOHO bus tours for just Ben and I to enjoy to break it up and do things lesiurely. Every cruise I take, I learn more about how to plan the next one that much better! :D

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  • 2 weeks later...
SilverDollarDoll

SilverDollarDoll

Posted
Posted
.

 

And yes, we did select dining. 6pm is too early for dinner and 8:30 is too late. I like eating at 7 or 7:30pm, so I choose select dining, then pre-reserve dining time for one of those times. Then if I need to adjust on the ship, I can do so. Works great and I will continue doing it that way whenever possible.

 

Do you remember what time the shows are? I'm assuming there are two shows each evening???? Thanks.

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Shooraq

Shooraq

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Do you remember what time the shows are? I'm assuming there are two shows each evening???? Thanks.

 

I unfortunately don't. I didn't attend any of the shows. I actually wanted to see one - the Cirque du Soleil based one, but our dinner at Tuscan Grille ran past the late showing, which was fine, because we truly enjoyed the company. :)

 

Typically, cruise entertainment isn't for us. My husband is a jazz/funk musician on the side and can be critical of put-togetehr bands on cruise ships. We've only found one that he really liked and we went to see them often on the cruise ship. But in general, we catch a lot of music acts and Broadways shows in the Boston area, so we tend to get disappointed by cruise shows. Oasis of the Seas was the big exception... great entertainment there.

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Lois R Great Review Rare

Lois R

Posted
Posted
Robyn great job on the posts...

 

:cool: Sicily:

 

Santorini:

 

Amalfi Coast: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WqLijX9Q9-U

 

Rhodes:

 

Rome:

 

Still working on other ports... :)

 

Hi Ed:)...omg......after watching Sicily it almost made me cry........

(good tears).......we had such a wonderful cruise, didn't we?

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sunshine nana

sunshine nana

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Posted

I just got around to reading your review. It was great! We were on the Equinox cruise just before and went to some of the same ports. Just a couple of comments: we too had been disappointed in Athens on a cruise 2 years ago, so we joined a group from our roll call on a trip to Corinth and it was the highlight for DH. I loved it also! Thanks to our organizers. We toured Ephesus for the second time and it was great again!

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Shooraq

Shooraq

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I just got around to reading your review. It was great! We were on the Equinox cruise just before and went to some of the same ports. Just a couple of comments: we too had been disappointed in Athens on a cruise 2 years ago, so we joined a group from our roll call on a trip to Corinth and it was the highlight for DH. I loved it also! Thanks to our organizers. We toured Ephesus for the second time and it was great again!

 

That's what some of the people on our roll call did - organized a tour to Corinth. If I'm back on a cruise that stops in Athens, that will probably be what I do next. :)

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SilverDollarDoll

SilverDollarDoll

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Hi May, thanks:)....the other review was from our cruisemate named

Jill. (Her screen name is Sooper).

 

Hi Lois,

Trying to get your review of Greece post again and for some reason I can't.

This is what you gave me earlier:

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showp...&postcount=220

I can't get it to open anything. Is it correct? Thanks.

Micki

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Lois R Great Review Rare

Lois R

Posted
Posted
Hi Lois,

Trying to get your review of Greece post again and for some reason I can't.

This is what you gave me earlier:

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showp...&postcount=220

I can't get it to open anything. Is it correct? Thanks.

Micki

 

Hi Micki...here is a link...scroll to where you see my name which is

near the end of the thread. It is on there.

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=839874

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