Transatlantic

[luv2ski2]

We are considering booking a 12-13 day RCCL transatlantic cruise departing out of Southampton on 10/30 or 11/05 (Jewel or Navigator), sailing to FL with stops in the Canary Islands.

 

Can anyone tell us anything about these cruises? Weather? Ports? Passenger profile (average age etc.)?

[julieanne]

You'll need to list the rest of the ports! :) Coming out of Southampton, the weather tends to be cooler, so the seas a little choppier for the start of the crossing. Since you are not going later in the year, chances are, you willhave a very nice crossing since they take mostly a southern route. Passenger profile, hmmmmmm. Most of the passengers are repeat cruisers who wish to travel in Europe once they arrive, with many relaxing days at sea to unwind. I am all for these, as they are all we look for now! We love them! You can use weather.com or oceanweather.com to take a look at the past seasonal changes and gauge from there. Wunderground.com will also give weather for past seasons as well. Their weather is usually in the mid 50's to 60's that time of year. I have been to Funchal and Lisbon, the weather will be warmer and we enjoyed both ports. Lisbon has some great architecture and shopping. Funchal is very quaint and we did wine tasting which was a lot of fun! Oh, average age, it is quite a mix sometimes. You get a handful of children, along with young and older newlyweds, mid 40's-50's and older. It makes for a fun mix of people!

[petel]

I can't imagine having a bad time on either one of those ships. The weather should be mild. The ports are great and not too crowded because their season is near over. The age of the passengers is a great cross section of cruisers.

[MsWitty1]

I am booked on my first TA next month and have been doing a LOT of research. It is a different kind of cruise because there is so much time at sea.

 

From what I have found out the ports vary depending on which ship. I saw some fall TA on RCI that went to the Canary Islands/Morroco/etc. One of them even did a stop in the Carribean on the way back.

 

The weather will most likely be mild. This will really depend on where you go. If you know the ports you can check at http://www.weather.com to get average temps in those areas for the month.

 

I was really worried that the passenger profile would be mostly older, but on our meet and mingle sign up there are all age groups. I haven't seen too many people traveling with smaller children, but it is also harder to take them out of school that long.

 

Great prices! Great ports! Give it a try. My one tip - if someone would have told me - since roundtrip airfare is normally the same price as oneway, if not less, consider flying over to Europe this fall and then consider a TA going back over in the spring. Many people on our cruise are doing that.