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Emerald Princess - Rome To Venice - Fantastic Trip

Juliadlf

By Juliadlf,
in Princess Cruises

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Juliadlf

Juliadlf

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Just back from the 9/2/07 sailing of Emerald Princess Rome to Venice and had a great cruise.

Will be writing a more detailed review of the ship, tours we did and being a first time Cruise Critic group leader .

More to come but first unpacking, laundry and of course the mountain of mail that we need to open. :)

 

Julia

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Juliadlf

Juliadlf

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Hope you enjoy. Any questions, I'll come back and try to answer. Just so much that I had to cut the length on this.

Julia

 

 

Emerald Princess – Eastern Med/Greek Isle Cruise – September 2, 2007

Rome to Venice

 

The following review is about our experience/opinions with airlines, airports, hotels (pre and post cruise), private tours and independent touring.

For each of the private tours I arranged, I emailed to each participant who was sharing a particular tour with us the meeting place on board the ship (usually the Piazza on Plaza deck (#5) since most of the time we would be disembarking from midship deck #4 , time to meet, cost and recap of the tour prior to our leaving the US. I collected the monies for the tour (excluding any tips or lunch costs) each day at the meeting place prior to disembarking the ship.

 

Precruise: Rome - 2 days

Airline: We booked in early March our open jaw tickets through US Airways online. I thought we were going to have electronic ticketing and to my surprise they sent us paper tickets. Reason: We had a codeshare ticket as the flights we choose from US Airways would have us departing Venice on Lufthansa for a flight to Frankfurt and then changing to US Airways in Frankfurt to fly to Philadelphia and then onward to Ithaca -our final destination. I’ll provide some feedback on the return flights further in the review and our experience with Frankfurt and Philadelphia airports on the return.

No problems with the flights to Rome. Immigration in Rome was a breeze. No long lines as they quickly moved everyone through. Baggage was slightly delayed but perhaps a good thing as we had time to chat and meet some of the members from the Cruise Critic roll call. Luggage carts were either 1 or 2 euros.

 

Transportation: We prebooked a shuttle service for our transport from the airport to the hotel in Rome using RomaShuttle (www.romashuttle.com ). As we exited the baggage claim area, the driver was waiting for us with our name on the sign. We ended up with a private car service for the price of the shuttle. Nice.

 

Hotel: Hotel dei Mellini – Rome (www.hotelmellini.com) . One of the best finds for us. This was our third visit to Rome and we like to try different hotels in different areas. Knowing that the central area of Rome is great for the “first time” visitor, we opted for a hotel across the Tiber River. After researching on TripAdvisor and seeing both good and bad reviews we decided the negatives were not that strong. Glad we booked as the hotel is a gem. Staff, service and room accommodations exceeded our expectations. I had contacted the hotel in 2006 to inquire about pricing and found they gave us a great rate which included room, taxes and breakfast in the pricing. As a tip, try emailing hotels directly to see what pricing you will get rather than booking through their website or third party companies. Be sure to have them quote for the room, ALL taxes/fees and breakfast to be included.

 

Tour in Rome: After much consideration, we decided to book a private full day tour in Rome visiting some of the familiar places and including a few new ones. After researching companies to use, we decided on LimoinRome – Claudio Caponera (www.limoinrome.com) as our driver/guide for the day. We shared this tour with 3 couples from our roll call. Since we were all staying at different hotels in Rome, Claudio arranged to pick each of us up at our hotels and drop off without increasing our tour costs. Our itinerary included The Roman Forum, Coliseum, Mouth of Truth, Circus Maximums, the Key Hole (Sov Mil Ordine Di Malta), Palatine Hill, Baths of Caracalla, The Catacombs, the Pantheon, Trevi Fountain, Spanish Steps, Capitol Hill, and Gianicolo (great views of Rome from this spot) and Borghese Gallery. Claudio arranged for our lunch stop at Ristorante Massenzio. Good meal. If we could have eliminated one thing in the itinerary it would, in our opinion, have been the Borghese Gallery. After a full day of sightseeing, I for one was on “information overload”. I would suggest that the Borghese Gallery be done by itself or perhaps along with a walk through the garden areas.

 

Transportation to Port Embarkation Day: I had organized shared transport with several of the roll call members for the port using RomaShuttle service. We had 1 bus (several people were staying at the same hotel) plus 2 vans (3 couples to each van). They made all the necessary stops at the hotels for the pickups. No need to lug the luggage to a central place. I was told by those who were picked up by the bus that the driver reversed the order of the pickups and was 30 minutes late. No issues with the vans pickups.

 

Embarkation: Smooth and easy.

 

The ship: Large and beautiful. Stateroom and service were terrific. Purser’s desk still needs some additional staff for those peak times but overall I think they do great job.

We had opted for Personal Choice/Anytime dining this time around. Glad we did. With a port intensive cruise the ability to decide where and when you want to dine is a great option. Never had to wait for a table for two or if we decided to join others. We tried both anytime/personal choice dining rooms – DaVinci and Michelangelo and service in both were equal. Food and service were good. On several occasions we did go to the Café Caribe for our dinner meal. At times we thought the food choices in the Café Caribe were better than in the dining room. Excellent service by the waitstaff in Café Caribe. For breakfast we would either go to the dining room (if we didn’t have a very early tour) or the Horizon Court. Both were good.

 

Cruise Critic Get Together: On embarkation day we arranged on our roll call to meet at the Outrigger bar after the muster drill. I think we may have taken over the whole area since so many of us showed up. Marion from the roll call had provided name tags for all the participants which was a great way to put faces with names from the roll call. It was great to meet everyone. Since we would all be touring over the next several days it was a great opportunity to meet those we would also be touring with throughout the cruise.

 

Port: Monte Carlo - Tender port - Arranged a private full day tour with Michel Legrand of Revelation Tours (www.revelation-tours.com). Our itinerary included Monte Carlo, Eze, La Turbie, Roquebrune, and Menton. Michel uses a microphone in the van which helps greatly for everyone to hear what he is saying as we drove from place to place. At each stop we would go by ourselves and then meet back up with Michel at a predetermined location and time. We stopped for lunch where we all choose to eat where we wanted to, do some shopping/browsing and then meet back at the van at a given time. We shared this tour with 3 couples from the roll call. Bought two bottles of wine. No problem with bringing it onboard the ship and can report that both came home in the checked luggage okay. Michel met all our expectations for a fabulous tour. Would highly recommend him to others.

 

Port: Livorno – Florence/Pisa – Arranged a private tour through LimoinRome – Claudio Caponera (www.limoinrome.com)for two vans which would hold 8 passengers each. The tour was shared with 7 couples from the roll call. Drivers were Daniele and Maurizio. Both drivers were on the dock with the signs waiting for us as we disembarked the ship. Dressed in suits, I found them both quite friendly and easy to speak with. The itinerary included Pisa to view the Leaning Tower, Piazzale Michelangelo, Accademia Museum, S.Maria del Fiore: the Cathedral, the Giotto bell tower, the Baptistry, S. Lorenzo leather market and Church of Santa Croce. We had a couple of hours of rain when we traveled from Pisa to Florence. When arriving in Florence at the overlook, it was pouring and the wind made it less than desirable to be outside taking pictures. After lunch the sun was shining and it was beautiful weather. I requested if we could go back at the end of the tour to the overlook and get those much wanted photo shots we had missed earlier in the day before we headed back to the ship. One thing about private tours, you can adjust your scheduling and your driver can drive through the streets to the sites where the hordes of people are walking. It was a sea of people moving through the streets and it’s amazing how the drivers can get through without anyone getting hurt. We had time to go to the outdoor market for some shopping/browsing. This was our third visit to Florence and never a disappointment to revisit one of our favorite cities. One point on this tour is that we could have benefited from the driver having a microphone so it would be easier for those in the back of the van to hear what he was saying.

 

Port: Naples – Arranged for a private tour through DriveAmalfi with Salvatore (*****) to tour the Amalfi Coast. Unfortunately our ship was late docking in Naples due to some shipping traffic and so we did not get off the ship and start our tour for several hours. The positive side to a late docking was our ship delayed leaving the port for 1 hour so we did get to see all that we had planned for the day. We shared this tour with 3 couples from our roll call. We stopped for lunch at a restaurant called S.Giovanni. Great spot and the food was good. Had a sample taste of lemoncello and meloncello as well. Purchased a bottle of lemoncello in Amalfi and had no problems with it in the checked luggage back home. This was our third visit to Naples and have visited Pompeii twice so choosing just to do the Amalfi coast was a good decision for us.

 

Sea Day: Time to sleep in, do some laundry and just relax.

 

Port: Santorini – Tender Port - We decided to do a day on our own for this port stop. Tendering ashore was quite a thrill as the tender boat and the docking areas (off the ship and also on the island) were not always in sync. Quite a few times they had to stop people from boarding or disembarking the tender since the boat was moving too far away from the step off point. We took the tram up to the top – 4 euros each one way. Spectacular view when you’re going up or down. Lots of donkey poo on the streets. Ventured out through the narrow streets and donkey poo to find the famous blue doom church. Spent time at the archeological museum, did some shopping/browsing and then headed back to the ship around 1:00pm and have lunch on board the ship for a change.

 

Port: Kusadasi – Arranged a private tour through Meander Travel. I can’t begin to describe what a great tour this is and the company was just wonderful. Our guide for the day was Rika Akyuz who took us to all the sites and described for us what we definitely would not have gotten from any book we bought. We shared this tour with 5 couples from the roll call. The tour included Ephesus, Ephesus Museum, Basilica of St John, House of the Virgin Mary and the Terrace Houses. Note: Terrace houses for those with walking issues may want to skip this as the steps inside the site do have hand rails but when you exit the excavation site you have to walk down (no other way to exit) many steep stone steps where there are no hand rails. The guide had warned the group before she purchased the entrance tickets that this may be an issue and if anyone wished to wait outside for the group to return. A couple of people opted to wait and not go in. If your tour does not separate out the cost for entrance to the Terrace Houses you may wish to request they do this as it would save some money for those who decide they can’t do the stairs.

We had lunch included with our tour which was at a rug company. Don’t worry, there was no pressure to buy a carpet but you will find the demonstration on how they make carpets interesting. Food was very good and a great selection to try. Drinks other than bottle water was extra.

 

Port: Mykonos – Did this port stop on our own. Took the shuttle to the drop off place and walked into town to find the famous windmills and Pablo. Now, we had read about a Petros but we thought the port speaker on the ship was saying Pablo. We got some great photos of the windmills from different points on the walk up. Then while sitting in a café we saw Pablo (or is it known as Petros?)who everyone was treating like a rock star. Hordes of people following him, taking his photo and getting a photo posing with him and quite frankly, I think Pablo enjoyed all the attention. Pablo (Petros) is a pelican.

 

Port: Athens – Arranged a full day private tour with Athens Taxi – Paul (www.athenstaxi.org) Paul was waiting for us as we exited the cruise terminal. Our itinerary included Acropolis, The National Archaeological Museum, The Tower of Winds, The Old Palace, The Greek and Roman Agora, The Temple of Zeus, Olympic Stadium, and the Plaka. We shared this tour with 7 couples from the roll call. Paul hired a licensed guide for a half day at our request to do the visits of the Acropolis, Greek and Roman Agora, Changing of the Guards at the Palace, Olympic Stadium, Temple of Zeus. Our licensed guide was excellent. Her name was Efi and she paced the tour at the right pace. She gave an excellent background on the sites we visited with her. We ended the tour with her on the Plaka. Most of the group ate together at a restaurant and then went about to shop/browse on our own and then meet at a predetermined location for pickup by Paul. Overall the day was excellent and glad we had the guide. Would highly recommend Paul and the licensed guide.

 

Port: Katakolon – Tender Port - Arranged half day private tour of Olympia and the Museum with Gemma Economopoulou (geconom@otenet.gr) who is a licensed guide. We shared this tour with 6 other couples from the roll call. Gemma is a wonderful guide and paced the tour and kept us as much as possible in the shaded areas and someplace to sit while she gave us background on what we were seeing. The damage from the fires can be seen on the roadside and hillsides and the smell of burning wood is still evident. She is a very impressive guide and we would highly recommend her. Note: We had a tender on this port so not sure if this was due to the previous issues with the fires as we had expected to be docked per our itinerary.

 

Port: Corfu – Arranged a 3 hour private taxi tour with Corfu Private Tours – Dimitris Dafnis (www.corfutaxitours.com) The itinerary I set up with him prior to our arrival was to go to the hilltop villages of Lakones or Bella Vista which would offer us views of the Bay of Paleokastritsa, Monastery founded in 1225, scenic drive to village of Makrades, Troumbetta Pass, the village of Scripero, Kanoni to view Mouse Island and a visit to a small church in Corfu town. Dimitris is very passionate about giving you the best tour possible and following the program you wish but he will make suggestions to help maximize your time. He can at times seem to be very intense on following the program but I think it could have just been his way of communicating. Not offense in anyway and at times we found him to be quite funny and providing a good insight into family life on Corfu. We shared this tour with another person from our roll call. As promised he was waiting for us outside the cruise terminal building which is also has the Duty Free shop. The tour was okay. The Duty Free shop provided free shuttle service from and to the ship all day. Since we walked back from Corfu town to the cruise terminal it was a nice relief to hop on the shuttle to the ship even if it was for just 5 minutes. The ship was expecting to sail away from Corfu at 4:00 pm and get an early start for Venice so we could arrive earlier in the day in Venice. But alas, there was a couple who was missing and so the ship did not sail on time. I’m not sure why the ship waited since the warning is always be back on board or else the ship leaves without you. Announcements for so and so to please call the pursers desk went unanswered so then they started to announce in another foreign language Quite a show watching from the outside deck the port authority running back and forth to the Duty Free shop and then the arrival of one of the missing passengers being driven on a motor cycle and right behind was a port car with the other person in it. Maybe they were the rock stars……

 

Port: Venice – We started our sail into Venice at 2:00pm. Get ready to pick a spot before the crowds start to crush you at the railings. Spectacular sail in. This was our second visit to Venice having previously visited on an overnight cruise port stop. Once the ship had docked and we had been cleared to disembark we headed over to the ACTV to purchase our waterbus tickets to be used over the next couple of days. Got on the waterbus to St Marks Square to check out the hotel location we would be staying at post cruise and then back to the ship to pack up our luggage as we disembark the following day to start our post cruise stay for 2 days. Since we had been to Venice before, we decided to spend more time in Murano and Burano and just wander the streets of Venice.

 

Disembarkation: Princess runs a very smooth process. Once we disembarked the ship, Princess bused us over to the terminal building where you will easily find your luggage. Exiting the terminal building the private Venezia Water Taxi service desk is on the right hand side. Check the signs as there are two water taxi services near the exit. Once they verify a water taxi pickup, you pay and they give you a slip with the water taxi number on it. Since we were staying at the Locando Orseoleo and not wanting to drag our luggage to the hotel we ordered the private water taxi and specifically asked the attendant that we needed to go to the water window of the hotel. We then proceed back outside with our luggage to an area just in front of the cruiseship where the water taxis were coming in to pickup passengers. We waited about 30 minutes for our water taxi to arrive and finally we were on our way to the hotel. Note here that we hired a private water taxi that was suppose to be just for the 4 of us with our luggage. We then find that the water taxi company had taken two additional people on with their luggage and charged them 80 euros for the two of them and charged us 100 euros for the 4 of us. When I asked the water taxi driver about not taking on additional passengers he said he would give us 10 euros back on the cost. I asked the driver if we would be going to the water window at the hotel. Yes, he said. Well, no we didn’t. He docked near St. Marks square and proceeded to tell us that the water level was too high and they couldn’t go any further. So here we are dragging our luggage to the hotel. Lesson learned: Don’t count on using the water window if you have alot of luggage. Make sure you can pull your luggage several blocks over a small bridge with steps to the hotel.

 

Post Cruise Hotel: Locanda Orseoleo (www.locandaorseolo.com) – It’s just as described by many other travelers who have used this hotel. Perfect location. Warm and very friendly owner and staff and the hotel has character and a certain ambience that you don’t find in the larger hotels. No elevator which isn’t a problem as the staff at the hotel takes your luggage up to your room for you and also helps to bring it down when you leave. Great location. Non smoking. We had room 14 which had a small sitting area with balcony type windows and then the bedroom area with windows and a bath. Ample space in the room. We could view the canal with the gondoliers below from our windows.

 

We enjoyed our two days in Venice as we got to do the city at our pace and not worry about the cruiseship leaving and watching the time. We did go to Murano and Burano and found the leisure time we spent walking on both a great benefit. We did attend a glass blowing demonstration on Murano which lasted about 15 minutes, did some shopping/browsing. On Burano, we walked around to take photos of the many painted houses, shopped/browsed and ate at this great restaurant called Riva Rosa.

 

We had hired a private water taxi with another couple for our return to the airport which was very interesting navigating out the water window into the water taxi and then going through the water canals in the darkness until you reach the open waterway to get to the airport. You dock at the airport and we had arranged for a van to pick us up and take us to the terminal building from the dock. It was worth the money to do this. Luggage carts at the terminal building cost .50 euros. The airport was easy to navigate to get to the check-in as it’s not a huge airport. Lufthansa staff was great. We then just had to sit and wait for our flight to be called for boarding. Luggage was checked through to our final destination and got boarding passes for each of our connecting flights.

When we arrived in Frankfurt – Terminal 1 A for our connection on US Airways, we followed the signs to C (Terminal 1). Note: Before you go through the security area to reach your gate if you want any food get it here as there is limited availability once you go through the security checkpoint.

After security you then have passport control to exit the country. As we followed the signs to C8 gate area we had another checkpoint where they ask to see our boarding passes. If your flight is not due to leave within a certain time frame they will not allow you to go through as we saw them turn several people away. Once at the boarding area they then did another security check of who packed our bags, etc etc and told us to go to the desk area to have new boarding passes reissued. We have no idea why they needed to redo all the boarding passes. They verified how many pieces of luggage we had checked when we left Venice and then reissued all new boarding passes. Note: Once you enter the seating area for C8, there are no restrooms. Flight on US Airways went without any problems to Philadelphia. Arrived on time. Breezed through passport control, picked up our luggage and went through customs – no problems or wait time. Note: Luggage carts at PHL costs US$3.00. Put the luggage back on the connecting flight luggage belt (signs are clearly marked as to where to go) and headed for our connecting gate. Here is where there was a complete bottleneck as you have to go through a security check for the connections and met a sea of wall to wall people waiting and moving very slow. I would estimate it took us over 1 hour to get through the security. Once past this point, and if your connection flight is out of terminal F as ours was, we took the shuttle bus from gate A1 which drops you off at terminal F. I’m not sure if the security backup is a common issue but definitely allow at least 2 to 2 1/2 hours for connections through Philadelphia airport.

 

Overall this is one of the best cruises we’ve done and we highly recommend others to give it a try if you like to visit many ports with less sea days. Weather was great throughout the trip and glad we choose early September to do this cruise. The members of our roll call were a pleasure to meet and share tours with. We have great memories of this adventure. Would definitely do this trip again.

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Juliadlf

Juliadlf

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Thank you for the review. Did you do a full day in Athens or 1/2 day. We are trying to decide if we can do everything in half a day.

Donna

 

Full day. We just hired the licensed guide for 1/2 day to hit the highlights with us. The rest we could do on our own wtih Paul.

 

Julia

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PTC

PTC

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It's always a pleasure reading the reviews of past cruisers who have done this ship and sailing and provide more detail information for others . Your viewpoint and experience with the private tours is a big help.

Thank you very much.

 

PTC

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gts_sdca

gts_sdca

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We're new to the cruising scene. Planning our honeymoon cruise departing April 30. I read your review (btw..very nice job) and was curious what you meant by "roll call"? Sounds like a good way to meet people and find some tour partners. Hope to hear from you. Thx

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Juliadlf

Juliadlf

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We're new to the cruising scene. Planning our honeymoon cruise departing April 30. I read your review (btw..very nice job) and was curious what you meant by "roll call"? Sounds like a good way to meet people and find some tour partners. Hope to hear from you. Thx

 

Check out Host Caroline's note at the top of this forum as to "how to locate your roll call". http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=630143

 

 

Have a great cruise.

 

Julia

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