Norwegian Jade Back to Back Review

[KeithJenner]

The Jade is supposed to arrive in Santorini at 10am. What time is the first tender group called to get off?

 

 

I can't remember exactly, but it was around 10am. Maybe slightly after.

[JMHAM1]

I'm living vicariously through you. This would be a dream trip for me but we have too many little kids so we will have to wait until they are older. We are in the group that enjoys Barcelona. Odd thing about Barcelona and any other place we stopped in Europe, the locals would speak to me in English but would not speak to my husband in English. If we needed help with menus or directions or the like, he would step away and I would get the information then he would come back. I was wondering if it was due to him being so much larger than everyone. We were taking a local train in Italy and everyone gave him plenty of room. He's 6'5" and that seemed very out of the norm for the area.

 

Would go back in a heartbeat and have always dreamed of doing the Venice trip. I'll put it on my bucket list and hope for the best.

[cnd_angel]

Love this review...thank you for taking the time to do it! I will be sailing on Jade Sept 27.. Also booked the 14 day cruise... Do you have copies of the daily posted anywhere? Can you talk a little about entertainment and shows...did they all repeat on week 2?

 

 

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[Quilting_Cruiser]

Do you have copies of the daily posted anywhere?

 

 

 

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2093691

Edited September 13, 2014 by Quilting_Cruiser

[bluesea777]

The Jade is supposed to arrive in Santorini at 10am. What time is the first tender group called to get off?

 

I can't remember exactly, but it was around 10am. Maybe slightly after.

 

I believe Jade anchors at Santorini at 1:30pm and departs at 10pm.

 

We are on the 18 Oct Greek Isles on Jade, and your review was so interesting and informative - thank you!

Edited September 13, 2014 by bluesea777

[FSNA5861]

Thanks for your great review. We will be on the Jade for the 21 day B2B Mediterranean cruise 1-22 Nov 2014 from Rome (Civitavecchia).

[KeithJenner]

Love this review...thank you for taking the time to do it! I will be sailing on Jade Sept 27.. Also booked the 14 day cruise... Do you have copies of the daily posted anywhere? Can you talk a little about entertainment and shows...did they all repeat on week 2?

 

 

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Thanks for your comment. I see the dailies have been linked for you already.

 

Sorry, I can't help with the entertainment. Other than live bands, and the Blue Men on the Epic, I don't really take much notice of the entertainment. As usually on NCL ships there were various guitarists etc playing in bars which were all nice, but nothing stood out.

 

I did take my son to watch the Lego Movie in Medusa one day. Not a great venue for movies, but there are a few screens so you could get a view of one.

 

 

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[KeithJenner]

I believe Jade anchors at Santorini at 1:30pm and departs at 10pm.

 

 

 

We are on the 18 Oct Greek Isles on Jade, and your review was so interesting and informative - thank you!

 

 

Yes, that sounds right. I didn't check the time when I originally answered. The tendering did start at around the published time though.

 

 

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[KeithJenner]

Thanks for your great review. We will be on the Jade for the 21 day B2B Mediterranean cruise 1-22 Nov 2014 from Rome (Civitavecchia).

 

 

That sounds like a fantastic itinerary. There are many ways of doing the Med and all of them are great.

 

 

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[KeithJenner]

It occurred to me yesterday that I left the review at Olympia and didn't mention disembarkation.

 

As has been reported, self walk off isn't offered in Venice. We usually do it this way, and my wife wasn't pleased about having to mess around with overnight bags. It wasn't a major problem though.

 

Our flight wasn't due to leave Venice until about 5pm, so we had quite a bit of waiting around. I considered spending the day in Venice, but it would mean messing around with baggage storage, so we decided to stay onboard until late and then head to the airport.

 

One advantage of not doing self walk off is that you don't have your bags with you, if you are hanging around on the ship. We had a leisurely breakfast, said goodbye to Raymond, our room steward (who was excellent) and then headed down to Bar Central with our iPads to waste an hour. We left the ship at about 10am when the announcements about disembarking were starting to get a bit more urgent.

 

As we had plenty of time, we took the people mover to Piazzale Roma. As was the case the previous week there was quite a queue, but that didn't prove to be the problem. The real issue is that the ticket machines are badly places, as you enter the station itself so that it is chaos as people with luggage try to get tickets whilst others are trying to get through the gates. Send someone without luggage to get the tickets when you get close, and stay in the queue if you can.

 

At Piazzale Roma, it was difficult to get around because of the people with luggage heading towards the people mover to get to their ships. I wouldn't want to do this bit in a rush.

 

We took the coach to the airport, which is very cheap and, despite the queues, there was plenty of room for everyone. Make sure you get the coach with luggage storage underneath and not the bus where you keep your luggage and it stops a lot.

 

We bought tickets from the office near the people mover, but others paid the driver, so it didn't seem to matter.

 

I'd heard a lot about Marco Polo airport and it wasn't as bad as I feared. They don't allow check in more than three hours before your flight, but we found a bench outside the terminal which was fairly comfortable and the iPads came into use again. We had booked our flights using miles, and were in business class, so were in the Marco Polo lounge, which is nice with a terrace looking over the runway and Venice itself. We watched the ships sailing away, and the fact that you can see then sailing past Venice from the airport shows just how big they are compared to the city itself. It does put it into perspective a bit when you see just how large the ships are.

 

Overall, not too bad a day considering. Marco Polo isn't a great place to be waiting though, and we are planning on taking an early flight next year and having to rush, rather than waiting around all day.

 

 

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[PathfinderEss]

Thanks for your review.

[kgd]

Keith- I enjoyed your review of the back to back cruise which you took. We are taking the same cruise this month. Can you advise if NCL has a formal night on the cruise. Are suits/ ties required or is dressing "smart casual" appropriate? Thanks.

[KeithJenner]

Keith- I enjoyed your review of the back to back cruise which you took. We are taking the same cruise this month. Can you advise if NCL has a formal night on the cruise. Are suits/ ties required or is dressing "smart casual" appropriate? Thanks.

 

 

NCL doesn't have a formal night.

 

There is no need for suits or ties, although I believe some people do dress us a bit - to be honest I don't take any notice of what people are wearing so can't really say how many people tend to on this cruise.

 

Just take what you are comfortable with. Smart casual is absolutely fine, although as per NCLs dress code, you can even wear shorts in any restaurant other than one of the MDRs and Le Bistro.