Just off the Gem 7th to 12th May 2023 (Croatia and Slovenia)

[ollienbertsmum]

So my DH and i have just done a 5-day cruise from Trieste.  Getting to Trieste itself seemed like a mission.  I will write about it in the Italy port board.  

 

This was our first cruise since the pandemic.  I chose just  5 days because I was worried we might not like the post pandemic changes.  I should not have worried.  There were a few crew wearing masks, not really any other way we would have known that there was a pandemic.  

 

I also chose 5 days because I was trying out an internal.  I have just retired and thought that if we did like internals we might increase the number of cheap last minute offers.  I actually did not like it.  I found it disorientating to wake up not knowing the temperature and amount of light. I am glad I tried but won’t repeat.  

 

I like spring as a time to travel.  I can go to the beach and sit in the sun at home during June to September. I prefer to travel in less busy times.  This did mean that we risked rain.  We got it twice but i had my rain coat with me. comfortable shoes were important.  

 

Getting to the ship

 

We stayed in Trieste overnight in an AirBnB.  I always wake early on embarkation days.  I had time to look around the attractive city centre.  I walked along the seafront to work out where we would go and where the bag drop was for when we came off the ship.  

 

 There were not many taxis for the fairly long queue at about 7.30 am.  It was a Sunday morning so was that an issue?  Someone in the queue asked me about getting to the train station.  I said that for me it was  easy and walkable (It was 1 km and flat).  Later I saw a number of passengers doing the walk.  Those who had large suitcases and a few extra bags looked as if they were puffing and panting.  So although I am fine dragging my 2 wheeled bag with a small back pack, those who have spinner wheels that are heavy might prefer to wait for a taxi.  I got back to the accommodation, We left at exactly 10 am.  We now had to negotiate around a  21 k run that ended in the main square but that gave the sea front of Trieste a real buzz on the Sunday morning.  

 

There was not much of a wait at the port.  Maybe this is one of the benefits of a smaller ship.  We were on the ship by about 11.30 am and having skipped breakfast went straight to the buffet and waited for rooms to open at 2.15 pm.  They were exactly on time.  

 

My thoughts on the ship 

 

The crew was lovely.   I was expecting that cabins would only get cleaned once a day.  Really that is enough for us.  The big disadvantage is that you might find that you are already back from the port and the room has not yet been cleaned.  When that happened to us I just asked for one clean towel.  We can make our own bed.  

 

The food was fine for me.   Did I notice a lower quality??   I think that there may have been a few things missing e.g. I don’t recall seeing smoked salmon at the breakfast buffet.  I don’t eat meat so I cannot comment on the quality.    I was not able to get a vegetarian sausage or burger so I felt a bit cheated at the grill area.  I am sure I have had one on a ship before.  May not have been NCL.  There seemed to be occasional moments when bar and restaurants seemed short of staff, but we never had to wait very long.   So now crew are not working for tips, it would seem that we are free to just enjoy and say thank you for  their good service   Not so fast …….  Now we have the feedback cards and vacation hero cards to fill in.   DH said it felt like he was being a schoolteacher again writing report cards.   A couple of times we had the cards pushed into our hands.  The pushy crew are going to get more feedback.  

 

I do like the smaller ships for less queuing and that I can find my way around.  There was never much of a wait for anything.  We choose to avoid the lifts but occasionally, if we wanted to go from level 5 up to level 12 we took a ride.  We never waited.  

 

There were a few small children on board, but they were all a credit to their parents.    There was a mix of passengers.  There was a much bigger percentage of europeans, especially Spanish and Italian which is not much of a surprise.  For five days you would not want to travel long distances and then only have Dubrovnik as the big attraction.  Adding on a week in Italy would of course make it wothwhile.  

 

Ports

 

According to one of our waiters NCL are testing out this route.  We went to Rijeka, Dubrovnik and Hvar in Croatia and Koper in Slovenia.  

 

Rijeka - A bit similar to Trieste.  Looking over my photos I can’t really tell which port is which.  I think it was the best shopping centre (Hvar had beautiful shops but they were expensive).  I was not cruising to shop, but I had already realised that I was cold on the ship so I bought some warmish leggings to go under my tops.    In Rijeka there was a staircase of 561 steps to get up to Trsat castle.  It was not really that difficult and worth the climb.  We have to find ways of working off the big breakfasts.  Views were lovely.  

 

Dubrovnik - We had been to Dubrovnik before so I was less excited about this port.  I was surprised how much I enjoyed it.  Our last visit had  been in hotter weather (September) and it was more crowded.  I felt that we could better appreciate the beauty of the city.  We went up the cable car for more views, there was a bit of a queue but not a deal breaker.   It was lovely.  We could easily have walked back down, DH was not keen.    Back in Dubrovnik I walked down to the little beach where they do kayaking.  That was attractive and peaceful. 

 

In the old town DH was cross when we got charged 10 euro for two small cans of beer (take out).  I pointed out to him that the absence of prices should have been a red flag.    Bars beside were charging less for beer.  We were ‘tricked’.  

 

Hvar - I don’t know what I expected but this was much better.  It was expensive, our dirnks were less expensive than  our hole in the wall bar in Dubrovnik, but you can tell that this attracts the rich crowd.  Lovely weather helped.  

 

We walked along the sea front.  All of the beaches were rocky.  I fancied dipping my feet in to see the temperature of the water.  I just felt that a wave might dampen my shoes and so the day.  

 

I found some more stairs, fewer than in Rijeka, and climbed up to a castle where I wrote some postcards while admiring the views.   Buying cards, finding stamps and finding postboxes is always a little mission when I visit new places.  I managed to do this in Hvar.  I’m always nervous that I have posted my cards in a private mail box. I got shown yellow Croatian boxes.  

 

I passed by a monastery that had a lace museum.  I knew that lace making is a symbol of Hvar.  I would have liked to go and see but they didn’t accept cards.  I think it was only 5 euro but I only had a few coins left so I made do with a post card! 

 

Koper (Slovenia) - We woke to rain, but it mostly stopped by the time we went ashore.  Here I had planned further walking around.   When we walked out of the port there were some kiosks selling tours.  For only 25 euro we could go on a scenic drive and spend two hours in the town of Piran.   So I booked for the last tour at  1 pm.  We had time to wander round the highlights of the town.  I bought another card because we were in a different country.    It was a really good value tour.  The guide talked non-stop.  The two hours was enough time to see around.  Another good view from a castle.  I had about 40 minutes to spare and noticed an aquarium.  It was tiny but I needed a toilet break before getting back on the bus.   For 7 euro I could kill time and the call of nature.  

 

So all in all a good set of ports, there was more to interest me than I expected.   We could have visited Lake Bled and Ljubljana from Koper.  Were I to go again I would look up ‘istranka tours’ and arrange ahead.  In reality I think I would prefer Ljubljana as a whole weekend destination.  

 

I don’t use the gym but wore my apple watch almost all of the time to motivate me to exercise.  I recorded 65 kilometres and climbing 162 flights of stairs.  

 

Is there anything more specific anyone wants to know????  I am happy to answer.  

[ollienbertsmum]

 

Oh and I forgot to say that we left two people behind in Rijeka.  We had waited for 15 minutes when they turned up.  I suspect that they had not adjusted their watches correctly.    The next port of Dubrovnik was  6 hr drive away - or 12hr public transport journey away.  I felt for them.  

 

The next day there were announcements for 3 missing passengers at sailaway time.   Getting to the next port would take a 5 hour bus, a ferry from Split and then a bus ride from Stari Grad to Hvar.  

 

OK so these are not calamities but they do spoil the smooth running of a trip. 

[UnbridledEnthusiasm]

I have some questions (hope you will see this!)

 

Did you spend any time or notice the pool area? Is the adult pool next to the kid's pool or is it in another area?

 

Were the hot tubs actually hot?

 

What was the nighttime entertainment?

 

Do you by any chance have any dailies you wouldn't mind sharing?

 

Thank you!

[ollienbertsmum]

I did not set foot in the pools or hot tubs.  Not very fond of them on the ship.  However I can comment that ….

 

The pools looked quite big compared to usual ship pools but that might be that few people were using them.  Weather was pleasant - anywhere between 16 and 21 degrees, but not ‘summer’.    

 

I saw one family in the hot tub on a day that was somewhat drizzly.  It must have been keeping them warm.  

 

No dailies.  I used to collect them but I am moving to a ‘paperless’ house.  Sorry.

 

The shows were ‘fair to good’.  A UK singer was on board two nights I enjoyed her,  but DH thought her choice of songs may not have suited the non-UK crowd.  

 

The two ‘shows’ were entertaining enough.  One was a medley of country songs.  I didn’t recognise any, I think that was aiming at the US passengers.  The other was ‘swing’ which I preferred but oddly also contained some country songs.  

 

Mentioning the show reminds me of how cold I found the ship, particularly in the theatre.  I should have taken a blanket for the show.  There was cold air blasting from the seats in front.  It did not matter where you sat.  

[Muckyduckway]

Enjoyed your review - we found Dubrovnik busier than the last time we were there (October 2022) but heading off the main street solved that.

NCL do actually have veggie burgers (regrettably they are far behind P&O with their veggie offerings) but you have to ask for them, they are cooked on demand. There's a notice up at the pool grill but we have ordered them in both the Garden Cafe and the Great Outdoors.

[ollienbertsmum]

1 minute ago, Muckyduckway said:

Enjoyed your review - we found Dubrovnik busier than the last time we were there (October 2022) but heading off the main street solved that.

NCL do actually have veggie burgers (regrettably they are far behind P&O with their veggie offerings) but you have to ask for them, they are cooked on demand. There's a notice up at the pool grill but we have ordered them in both the Garden Cafe and the Great Outdoors.

Ah so now I have thought about it I actually just asked for a veggie sausage.  This was in the Garden Cafe.  The chef laughed as he said no.  I had been really sure that I had seen or eaten them before on an NCL ship.  I was not willing to ask again.  

 

So to anyone else - insist.  

 

I am glad that you enjoyed the review.  I do like writing 

[Cruising to Retirement]

Any tips for the Ship-  going on the 6/9  10 night cruise- Venice to Slovenia, Croatia and Greek Islands... 

[ollienbertsmum]

Get back to the ship on time😄

 

I gave a lot of detail in my review, what do you want to know more about?