REVIEW -6/16/12 Mediterranean Venice Cruise on Solstice

[PathfinderEss]

Enjoying your review and wonderful pictures.

[gold1953]

Uh-oh. We have an AQ cabin a few away from yours. So sorry to hear about the steward. Are you willing to share his first name? Initials? I was hoping we'd have a great steward because our cabin is near the suites.

 

Loving your review!

 

Betsy

We had Fransesco, and by the sound of it he is still there . I filled out the end of cruise report, then and on-line survey that came after the cruise . I have heard NOTHING back but plan to persue this . We had spent the prior 2 weeks in CC on the same ship and everything was perfect!!

Fransesco... even let our flowers die .. yes drooping black flowers for the last 3 days and then there was the shriveled fruit which was supposed to be refreshed daily. I am talking a wrinkled apple and a black banana!!

I was too creeped out by him to say anything until the end of the cruise.

Also 2 items went missing from our cabin the 1st day. He only washed our balcony once in the 12 days. He had the cabins at the aft and in the hall on the right side . I hope you don't have him!!/

[strummer]

Loving your report - looking forward to the rest :)

[u2cruiser]

Loving your review too Wonders10. Looking forward to more. Your group sounds like great fun to cruise with :D

 

We had a 'not so great' female cabin steward on Equinox. It was the only single thing about the cruise that wasn't excellent. I was hoping it was a one off. At the end of the cruise she knocked on our door to tell us that we must mark her down as excellent on the questionnaire! :rolleyes:

[jagaul]

Thanks for the wonderful review and images! We will be on the Solstice for the 10/14 sailing and are in 9272 by the card room....hoping your cabin steward does not get transfered to that area! lol!

I'm anxiously awaiting the remainder of your review....it is so much fun to read in anticipation of our upcoming venture. I promise to write upon our return also and will have tons of photographs to share as well!

 

By the way...Betsy....are you perhaps looking for a tour in Rome..we and another couple are looking for one or two more couples to join us for a Rome In Limo tour that focuses mainly on ancient Rome.

Judy

[BBsails]

Wow! Thanks, gold1953, for alerting us to Fransesco. Is he the same as the steward you had, Wonders10? We'll definitely be on the lookout. Life is to short to have a lousy steward.

 

jagaul, we have been to Rome several times and have a tour guide that we love. I haven't contacted her re this trip, but if we book her we'd be glad to include others. Let me know if you're interested. Email: betsy at speakeasy dot org, so we can collaborate off the board. An alternative would be to collaborate on our roll call, which is pretty quiet.

 

Betsy

[Wonders10]

Wow! Thanks, gold1953, for alerting us to Fransesco. Is he the same as the steward you had, Wonders10? We'll definitely be on the lookout. Life is to short to have a lousy steward.

 

jagaul, we have been to Rome several times and have a tour guide that we love. I haven't contacted her re this trip, but if we book her we'd be glad to include others. Let me know if you're interested. Email: betsy at speakeasy dot org, so we can collaborate off the board. An alternative would be to collaborate on our roll call, which is pretty quiet.

 

Betsy

 

That was him! We didn't let it ruin our cruise at all because everything else was wonderful, but I'd say it was definitely sub-par service.

[buzzybuzzbuzz]

Shannon - All I can say is wow! What a great review.

 

I can't wait for the next installment, we are on Solstice on September.

 

Love, love, love it!

[Wonders10]

I'm so glad everyone is enjoying the review!

 

Wednesday June 20th

Today we arrive in Venice! As I read here on CC and the captain reiterated for us last evening, we just had to watch the sail in (as well as the sail out the following day). I woke up rather early and watched us sail into a hazy Venice while enjoying room service. (Sail out pictures were much better than sail in...you'll see those later)

We were docked and off the ship semi-early. We had no ship excursions planned and were “winging it” so to speak. We opted not to take the ships shuttle to St. Marks Square and instead took a boat (a traghetto maybe?) that was docked right outside the ship. It was 8 euro one way and 15 euro round trip. We opted for a one way ticket because we planned on walking back to the ship. Yes, you read that correctly. We got off at St. Mark’s Square and immediately got in line to tour the basilica.

I brought a scarf/shawl to cover my arms but I did have shorts on. Turns out, they were long enough but they did have a man checking your clothing and providing you with flimsy paper like scarves or wraps for shoulders and legs if you were not dressed appropriately. While we were waiting in line, my brother, sister in law, nephew and mom headed up to the bell tower to check out the view. Remember that fear of heights and closed in spaces…I was out. My niece stayed with me too. We had to wait a few minutes because the long line moved much quicker than we thought, but soon we were inside and it was gorgeous.

After touring the cathedral, we wandered the streets of Venice, visiting a smaller church, and had a mid morning gelato snack (this would become a pattern for us).

Then it was time for a gondola ride! It cost 80 euros for the 6 of us and lasted about 45 minutes. Honestly, I was terrified lol. It was a lot rockier than I anticipated but I’m glad we did it and I can cross it off my bucket list.

We had a quick sit down lunch in a small pizza place where we all split sandwiches and pizza. Nothing fancy, but it was tasty.

Continued in next post...

[Wonders10]

After lunch, we headed to tour Doges Palace

Through the bridge of sighs (as seen from our gondola ride earlier)

And into the adjoining prison.

By this point, we did some more walking around and decided it was time to head back. We were exhausted and it was HOT. So off we went, with a teeny map we took from a hotel that we passed by earlier. We passed by the Rialto Bridge on our way out of the “touristy” part of Venice.

It took forever to get anywhere near where we needed to be. We eventually found the peoplemover but my stubborn brother insisted we could just walk there. So, we continued on and soon we could see the ship! But how do we get to the ship? We walked down a street, down a bridge to what we thought was the entrance. Nope, not it. So we went back up the bridge and down again, around a corner, up and down another bridge and finally the Solstice was getting closer! After what seemed like hours (actually I think it did take us at least an hour to walk back), we were getting back on the ship.

Hooray!

It seems a little dramatic, but I was very tempted to kiss the ground when we actually made it back. It had been a looooong day. Because we didn’t get back onboard until close to 6:30 or so and we were soooo hot and tired, we decided to first do a pool/Jacuzzi combo and then eat dinner at the buffet. The casino wasn’t open (since we were still docked) and we were not interested in the show offered that night so we headed back to the room and called it an early night.

Up next...Venice sail out!

[buzzybuzzbuzz]

Keep it coming Shannon! I love it!!

[Wonders10]

June 21

Our second day in Venice. My mom, the kids and I had no desire to go back into Venice after our long day before, plus we had seen a lot of the “main” sites. My brother and sister in law did head back into town and visited the Accademia museum which they enjoyed. My mom and I did breakfast at Blu, then dropped off the kids at the kids club and headed for the Solarium for some pool time, reading and relaxation. It seemed a lot of people skipped out on the 2nd Venice day as the pools were pretty crowded considering we were docked in port. Everyone was back around lunch time so we had a burger picnic up on the lawn club and then headed to our port side balconies to watch sailaway. It was amazing.

 

Look, Italy has 2 leaning towers!

Because our rooms were on deck 11, we were able to hear the opera music playing from the pool decks as we sailed out. 10 times better than the sail in….so keep that in mind. If you can’t manage to get up that early, make sure you watch the sail out. You won’t be disappointed.

I’m not going to lie….after that point, I completely forgot what we did the rest of the day. Our sea days seemed to blur together and I wasn’t always diligent with my note taking. But I’m sure it was relaxing and I know we headed to the slots.

Up next...a HOT day in Kotor!

[Orator]

Enjoying your wonderful review and look forward to more posts. Can't tell you how refreshing it is to read well balanced posts that serve to help future cruisers. Thank you.

[Wonders10]

Enjoying your wonderful review and look forward to more posts. Can't tell you how refreshing it is to read well balanced posts that serve to help future cruisers. Thank you.

 

Thanks! I personally don't enjoy the reviews where people are nit picking every little thing. But I also think those people find faults in everything they experience so I take it with a grain of salt. Was our trip perfect? No, but it was pretty darn close. I'd say the "bad" parts were just us getting on each other's nerves haha. Definitely not Celebrity's fault!

[Wonders10]

Short video of our Venice Sail Out...pardon our mumbling in the background.

 

[AerynSun_JohnCrighton]

Short video of our Venice Sail Out...pardon our mumbling in the background.

 

 

Wow! You are doing great...I gotta start my review soon! You beat me to it! ;)

 

Did you miss the Cruisecritic party? I see you didn't mention it...

 

I met soo many people I can't remember but a few names!

 

lol!

 

Doge's Palace was a LONG tour wasn't it? There should be some sort of warning with it.. LOTS of steps! Ivy has back issues and mom can't do lots of steps and we couldn't find any exits...but I did enjoy crossing the bridge of sighs!

[Wonders10]

Wow! You are doing great...I gotta start my review soon! You beat me to it! ;)

 

Did you miss the Cruisecritic party? I see you didn't mention it...

 

I met soo many people I can't remember but a few names!

 

lol!

 

Doge's Palace was a LONG tour wasn't it? There should be some sort of warning with it.. LOTS of steps! Ivy has back issues and mom can't do lots of steps and we couldn't find any exits...but I did enjoy crossing the bridge of sighs!

 

Hey! No I actually never signed up for the CC party...I always sign up and never end up going so I just skipped it altogether. We're there a lot of people?

 

We did Doges on our own, but it was bigger than I expected and we were all hot and exhausted by that point.

[AerynSun_JohnCrighton]

Hey! No I actually never signed up for the CC party...I always sign up and never end up going so I just skipped it altogether. We're there a lot of people?

 

We did Doges on our own, but it was bigger than I expected and we were all hot and exhausted by that point.

 

Tons of people!

 

We did Doge's on our own too!

 

We actually went over to Museo Correr around corner and got combo pass for 16 euros to both and did that first. Rick Steve recommends that if line to Doge's is long. ;)

 

We went back to ship after Doge's around 3:30pm and took a nap... we went back out around 7pm to do Gondola ride *much cooler then, worth the extra 20 euros* and shopping and pizza at Rialto bridge!

[The Scotsman]

Thoroughly enjoing reading your review. looking forward o the remainder.

 

We are on Solstice in September but doing the Greek Isles and really looking forward to our second S-class this year. Previously thought the M class would be hard to beat but the Equinox blew our socks off in March - pretty much could not fault it and thought the staff on board were the best we'd experienced in 19 cruises. Hopefully Solstice will be as good.

 

Wanted to also comment on your findings of Barcelona and glad that the preconception fears were allayed. I couldn't agree more - it is a beautiful city and a great precruise destination. I think as long as you have your wits about you and are a savvy traveller you should not have any problems. Thieves are prevalent though and more so than many other cities so caution at all times.

 

The sail in / out of Venice is 'SPECIAL'. I have been lucky enough to have done it 3-4 times now and I don't think I would ever tire of sailing past St Marks Square - truly wonderful. Thanks for sharing your thoughts and pics.

[Wonders10]

Thoroughly enjoing reading your review. looking forward o the remainder.

 

We are on Solstice in September but doing the Greek Isles and really looking forward to our second S-class this year. Previously thought the M class would be hard to beat but the Equinox blew our socks off in March - pretty much could not fault it and thought the staff on board were the best we'd experienced in 19 cruises. Hopefully Solstice will be as good.

 

Wanted to also comment on your findings of Barcelona and glad that the preconception fears were allayed. I couldn't agree more - it is a beautiful city and a great precruise destination. I think as long as you have your wits about you and are a savvy traveller you should not have any problems. Thieves are prevalent though and more so than many other cities so caution at all times.

 

The sail in / out of Venice is 'SPECIAL'. I have been lucky enough to have done it 3-4 times now and I don't think I would ever tire of sailing past St Marks Square - truly wonderful. Thanks for sharing your thoughts and pics.

 

Thanks to you and everyone else for your kind words. Its fun writing the review...I get to relive the trip all over again!

 

More coming up...

[Wonders10]

June 22

Today we tendered in Kotor, Montenegro. Another do it yourself day for us. The captain again advised us to watch the sail in and this one did not disappoint. It was gorgeous! And wasn’t as early as the Venice sail in, which helped.

More to come later...dinnertime!

[deblew]

I'm having a great time reading your review. we were on the same sailing and I'm enjoying reading about your experience. very similar to ours so far.

[Wonders10]

Cont...

 

The tender situation seemed a little chaotic, moreso than on our Split day. I don’t know what the situation was but it seemed to be a bit delayed and even though we got our tender tickets shortly after 10 (when we anchored), it looked like we weren’t going to get off the ship til close to noon. But…my brother’s hovering near the gangway stairs paid off again and we managed to get off early. Like 10 tender ticket numbers early. Hey whatever works…and a special bonus, my cruise crush drove our tender boat and we had front row seats for the show. I mean, ride. To give you an idea of his magnetism, he was joking with the guests on the boat about remembering how to drive it and the boat erupted in applause when we docked. Seriously? Swoon…

 

 

Anyway, once on land, the family split up. My mom and I toured the town while the other 4 attempted to climb the fort. Mind you it was close to 100 degrees, or at least felt like it on this day. They did make it though and said they took many breaks, bought waters and agreed it was challenging, mainly because of the heat. My mom and I still sweated off at least 10 lbs, but had a more relaxing day in Kotor, visiting the many churches and some of the shops.

 

 

 

 

 

It was a very easy town to get around, but you didn’t need a full day. At least we didn’t. We did some shopping and grabbed a gelato (told you…). We headed back to the tender boats and the ship around 2:30, changed into our swimsuits and had lunch before settling into the Solarium and then the main pool. It was a very relaxing afternoon and a nice day exploring what we thought was an adorable town. Although, much like Split, we all felt they were still establishing themselves as a cruise port.

 

Bye Kotor!

 

 

We opted for dinner again at the buffet…we were a little too lazy to get all dolled up for dinner at Blu, plus we were getting tired by this point in the cruise.

 

Shocker, I don’t have notes about the show or if we went. Its not that I don’t remember what shows we went to, but I don’t remember the days we did them and I don’t want to get criticized for putting something down on the wrong day. So maybe at the end, I’ll do a quick entertainment review or if you have questions about it in the mean time, feel free to ask!

 

Up next...Our last day at sea.

[Wonders10]

June 23

Today was our last sea day, which I was actually pretty bummed about. As great as the ports were, I was really loving hanging out on the ship and relaxing with my book by the pool. It was the first of my cruises where I just wanted to enjoy the ship…probably because we were so busy as opposed to the Caribbean cruises I’m used to. The 6 of us went to Blu for breakfast and I had the French toast which was delicious. Then it was on to something we, well I, was really looking forward to. A lecture on the building of the Solstice. Okay, my alterior motive was actually to see who was giving the lecture…that’s right, my cruise crush, Staff Capt Tasos lol. Turns out, it was actually really really interesting and they showed a great video of the process from beginning to its arrival in Port Everglades.

Then Captain Costas did a Q/A with the audience and I’m sorry…some of the people asked really dumb questions. But it was great and I’m glad we went as on past cruises I would never go to any of these “educational” lectures. I guess I’m growing up.

Today was also the day of the big brunch in the MDR. I didn’t really care so much about it as I was loving my breakfasts in Blu, but we all did stop there for our lunch to check it out. It was yummy! We all had a variety of things and I had some sushi and salads, then hit the dessert bar.

One of the many ice sculptures at the brunch.

Since we got to the buffet for lunch, we were there finishing up as the staff was beginning to clean up the dining room. Then something weird happened. My nephew went up to grab something else and apparently decided he wanted a bowl of olives. So he comes back with my niece laughing hysterically. Apparently, one of the waiters wanted his bowl and poured the olives in his pocket. I question what my nephew says sometimes, but I have 100% faith in my niece who said it actually happened. I’m sure many of you might be appalled by it, but we thought it was just so weird and funny. Here he is with his olives…

 

We went to the photo gallery after brunch to check out some of the pictures we had had taken (which wasn’t many) and to get a good laugh at some of the other people’s pictures. Come on, don’t tell me you don’t do it too.

My mom and I then headed back to the room to chill for a bit before heading to the kids talent show where my niece and nephew both performed. It was cute. By this point, we were sailing through the Straits of Messina so we watched that before getting ready for dinner at Blu, where the 6 of us all dined together. I do remember going to the show tonight, but god only knows what one it was…they are all blurring together. The entertainment review will be coming.

After the show was “Dancing with the Stripes”. As a huge fan of Dancing with the Stars, and a fan of dancing myself, I was VERY tempted to sign up for this event…guests were to be paired with staff officers and managers in a dance competition in the main foyer. I decided not to…my ankle was hurting me, yeah that’s it…but man am I glad I did not sign up. Silly me was actually expecting a competition with dancing. What I saw was definitely NOT dancing lol. Although it was hysterical, and I found myself laughing out loud many times during the show. Then after the winner was announced, the Captain came out and said a few words before introducing some of the senior officers (all Greek I’m assuming) including my cruise crush (*sigh*) for a performance of the Zorba. It was great…the Greeks can dance! It was after 11:30 by this point and we were exhausted. The next morning we docked in Naples for our first RomeInLimo tour!

Up next...Pompeii and the Amalfi Coast!

[cidymom]

Loving your picture review. Regarding your observation about the Dancing with the Stripes, if they weren't dancing what were they doing? Curious minds want to know. I love watching Dancing with the Stars too!