Anyone Booked Lirica Transatlantic 27th December?

[Guest Anorak33]

I was considering booking us on the Genoa to Fort Lauderdale 18 day departing Genoa 27th December 2004.

 

Has anyone booked this already and what would be a reasonable rate for an inside on this cruise?

 

Not many online TA's seem to list MSC so its hard to find out.

 

Seems from all the posts on here that a transatlantic on Lirica may be good, and a Med cruise is a big no-no.

 

Statendam

QE2 (x2)

Regal Princess

Golden Princess

Royal Princess

Big Red Boat

[Guest Anorak33]

Can anyone help - we are in a bit of a quandary on this - 2 x TA's say the sailing is the 29th December - MSC website says the 27th.

 

?????????????????

 

 

And is anyone else from here on this sailing?

 

Seems not from the answers (0) so far.......................

 

Statendam

QE2 (x2)

Regal Princess

Golden Princess

Royal Princess

Big Red Boat

[Guest Anorak33]

Ok - now realise its a waste of time expecting any immediate help on here - maybe it will become a little busier as MSC try to tap the US marketplace.

 

We'll book it anyway and let you know.

 

Statendam

QE2 (x2)

Regal Princess

Golden Princess

Royal Princess

Big Red Boat

[Guest Anorak33]

I know that all my posts on here have met with a stony silence - either I'm wearing the wrong (or NO ) deodorant - or something.

However I did think I might mention we have just obtained the Transatlantic cruise on Lirica 27th Dec Genoa to Fll for $379 plus $399 port fees and taxes and "service charge".

Is this a reasonable cost? Its been hard to find out as many TA's don't list MSC.

 

I guess I'll be talking to myself again - so lonely!

[nocaper]

It is quiet here...But I have enjoyed listening in on your conversations with yourself!

 

If I could get the time off from work, I'd join that cruise! The price sounds great. We were on the Lirica in May and had a good time. It's a beautiful ship. Hope you enjoy it as much as we did. We will probably do the Lirica or Opera next Spring. I'll be looking forward to your comments after your cruise!

[SSSkipper]

I just looked up the price and found inside rooms to start at $1500 per person. How did you get such a great price? I'd take it!

[Guest Anorak33]

ssskipper - I was orginally quoted about $920 all in by a travel agent - but finally won an auction for 2 berths - the auction was on twice a week for both the December Lirica transatlantic and the November Opera one. They also auction other msc cruises quite often.

My email is anorak33@hotmail.com if you need to contact me for any reason.

[cruiseyguy]

CruiseQuick.com has announced that it will be representing MSC Cruises.

[czechmate]

Hi .Big shame that you were left alone and in silence for so long.

Earlier this year I was having enormous difficulty trying to book with MSC. USA could provide itineraries, prices, etc but Europe or at least Austria was in total darkness on any and all information.

Thanks to ***** and especially Drew Tate of CruiseVacationOutlet I finally made a reservation for Opera on the Return to the Old Continent sailing of 2nd April, 2005. Looking forward to that immensely.

It was necessary for me to make my own flight arrangements but thanks to lastminute.com that was not a great problem and again superb prices.

When the Vienna agent was finally able to come up with a price to my huge delight I had saved almost 50% on the deal!!

Urge everyone use ***** and also Cruise Vacation Outlet and I am sure that you will not be disappointed.

 

I am certain that you will have a fabulous cruise on Lirica. Sailed on her in March this year and had a truly wonderful time. Food and Service were very good indeed. Relax - go with the flow and let the troubles float away!!

 

Best wishes

 

Barry

[MortgageChick]

Never been on MSc, but Skyauction.com auctions their ships for next to nothing on a regular basis

[Guest Anorak33]

All I can say to anyone thinking of using skyauctions is do a search on google using the keywords "sky" "auctions" "scam" and if you want - "cruise" and see how many results come up.

 

My experience is that I won an auction, paid for it, then yesterday they emailed me telling me there was no availability for what I had won and paid for but if I paid an extra $500 I could have an outside cabin.

[SSSkipper]

Sorry to hear about them doing the bait and switch! That is what it sounds like to me too. Hope it works out for you! I just booked Jewel of the Seas for May 1st leaving out of Florida and ending in London. 14 days total, and stopping in Bermuda, Paris and a few other ports. Take care.....

[bigmike7]

Yo-

 

Funny - I've won a couple of cruises on Skyauction - no problems.......

 

Sorry to hear that you had a bad experience.......

 

Happy Cruisin'

 

Mike

[Montreal Marc]

Hi,

 

Count me in!

 

I've booked an inside (as I'm a solo traveller and enjoy the peaceful quiet afforded by total darkness).

 

I've always wanted to do a trans-Atlantic, but could never find one at this time of the year, when I prefer to get outta town (I HATE winter!!!). So when I noticed this cruise on one of my weekly newsletters, I checked it out and booked right away.

 

I also just returned from a wonderful time on Celebrity's Summit (Seward to Vancouver Aug 6), so this year will be a special one in my books.

 

Hope we can get a large enough group together to constitute a CC party!

 

Marc

[garlandexcellent]

Nice to meet you, Marc. I am also booked on the Lirica crossing as a single, in an inside cabin. I booked the cruise through cruisequick at a very good rate. This will be my 47th cruise and my 7th transatlantic.

 

Howie

 

Hi,

 

Count me in!

 

I've booked an inside (as I'm a solo traveller and enjoy the peaceful quiet afforded by total darkness).

 

I've always wanted to do a trans-Atlantic, but could never find one at this time of the year, when I prefer to get outta town (I HATE winter!!!). So when I noticed this cruise on one of my weekly newsletters, I checked it out and booked right away.

 

I also just returned from a wonderful time on Celebrity's Summit (Seward to Vancouver Aug 6), so this year will be a special one in my books.

 

Hope we can get a large enough group together to constitute a CC party!

 

Marc

[garlandexcellent]

I've booked this cruise on Dec 27th through cruisequick. It is also available on Vactionstogo.com.

 

Howie

 

I was considering booking us on the Genoa to Fort Lauderdale 18 day departing Genoa 27th December 2004.

 

Has anyone booked this already and what would be a reasonable rate for an inside on this cruise?

 

Not many online TA's seem to list MSC so its hard to find out.

 

Seems from all the posts on here that a transatlantic on Lirica may be good, and a Med cruise is a big no-no.

 

Statendam

QE2 (x2)

Regal Princess

Golden Princess

Royal Princess

Big Red Boat

[Guest Anorak33]

Just had a look at ***** - and they want $56 less ($1500) for ONE passenger in an inside than we paid for TWO passengers ($1556)

I have used them in the past and been very happy but they do seem hopelessly uncompetitive on this cruise.

[garlandexcellent]

I booked through cruisequick at $1556 for a single. I'm a little confused here, are you booked on this cruise or not?

 

Howie

 

Just had a look at ***** - and they want $56 less ($1500) for ONE passenger in an inside than we paid for TWO passengers ($1556)

I have used them in the past and been very happy but they do seem hopelessly uncompetitive on this cruise.

[Guest Anorak33]

I sure am - please don't cancel your cruise just because of me! (rofl)

 

I guess it just shows that a single passenger really does pay double. I am really sorry about that, its part of the reason why I don't travel on my own.

 

Just to avoid further confusion when I mentioned earlier in this thread that I had trouble with skyauction it was not with the auction for this cruise but for a different one on a different ship and a different line.

 

Skyauction were dirt cheap in the beginning on this cruise but then as the weeks progressed the winning bids (and the port fees and taxes) went up and up until they were about $200 or more for each passenger than I paid. I don't know if the bids were being pumped up artificially or whether there were just more bidders interested.

 

All I know is that the same bidder names seemed to be bidding on more than one cruise at a time which I found highly suspect.

[garlandexcellent]

Glad you're going. I've started a roll call on this, under "roll calls, other cruiselines", so far there are no responses. When are you getting to Genoa, and have you found a hotel? I fly to Rome on Christmas eve, get there Christmas morning, and fly immediately to Genoa. I'm looking for a nice place to stay for two days that is in the center of the action (assuming there is any action to be had in Genoa).

 

Howie - looking forward to my 47th cruise and 7th transatlantic.

 

I sure am - please don't cancel your cruise just because of me! (rofl)

 

I guess it just shows that a single passenger really does pay double. I am really sorry about that, its part of the reason why I don't travel on my own.

 

Just to avoid further confusion when I mentioned earlier in this thread that I had trouble with skyauction it was not with the auction for this cruise but for a different one on a different ship and a different line.

 

Skyauction were dirt cheap in the beginning on this cruise but then as the weeks progressed the winning bids (and the port fees and taxes) went up and up until they were about $200 or more for each passenger than I paid. I don't know if the bids were being pumped up artificially or whether there were just more bidders interested.

 

All I know is that the same bidder names seemed to be bidding on more than one cruise at a time which I found highly suspect.

[Guest Anorak33]

I like to live dangerously - we will arrive in Genoa the morning of cruise departure so have not booked a hotel.

Looking at the map of the town the airport runway seems to be built out in the port area and is not far from the cruise terminal as the crow flies, but we will still take a cab to the ship as we know its not walking distance.

We will be in London for Christmas so its not too far to come. Ryanair have an economical flight from London Stansted to Genoa for about $60. Otherwise it was Alitalia for $600 for the London Heathrow to Genoa on the same day.

It is now not usual for Southern England to get snow until late January if at all so we hope there won't be any weather delays for the flight.

I do not know when Italians celebrate the Christmas festivities, these vary from country to country to a large extent.

See you on board, we are looking forward to it but with a few reservations.

[Magwa]

Are you going to manage for 3 weeks on 15kg of hold luggage & 10kg of hand luggage?

[Guest Anorak33]

We will have to manage - we just flew Easyjet on another cruise connection and had to manage with 20kg hold and a 5kg hand luggage - but then found out that Easyjet have no weight limit on hand luggage BUT it must fit in a designated small space so you couldn't really get more than about 5kg in anyway unless you were transporting gold bricks - which we are not unfortunately.

Easyjet at Barcelona were actually very pleasant and did not even look at the scales when we checked our luggage but we were within the limit as we had cut right down on clothes.

Easyjet also did not enforce the rule about only one piece of handluggage on the flight we travelled on. They may well do on flights originating from UK as their checkin staff seem very harsh there.

Even then we had managed to pack our formalwear but then found there were no formal nights when a tux was "required" so that was a waste of time.

We have downsized everything we own - examples are:

 

CD Player out - MP3 player in

Featherweight pair of Rockport formal shoes

Thinner bathrobe - weighs half what the old one did

No Hawaiian shirts (very sad about that)just lightweight polo shirts

Thinner socks - and only 2 pair

Thinner shirts - and only 3

Thinner pants - and just 2 pair

Lightweight jacket

New digital camera - weighs a quarter of the old one

New digital camcorder - also weighs a quarter of the old one

No films - and don't take a spare camera any more

Tiny pair of binoculars - nearly as good as the old ones and much lighter/smaller

No books - rely on ship's library

Wine - take a box of each of our favorites instead of several bottles - less breakage risk and packs in a smaller space

 

Even though there may not be a laundromat on the ship we will just take fewer clothes. Our first really formal cruise in a Q3 cabin on the QE2 we took so many clothes and found we were changing up to 5 times a day - how crazy is that - not doing that again.

 

Mix and Match is the secret - same shirt - different tie etc. Wash clothes out in the bathroom and hang 'em up in the shower. Looks like a Chinese laundry but that can't be helped.

 

All the above weightsaving measures and probably some others implemented over the years have reduced our load by 10kg each which is great for hauling around as well as on the airplane.

 

Only heavy thing I haul now that I didn't before is a laptop PC - really need that for downloading the photos and keeping in touch, also when we arrive at our destination and stay I have to have it for contacting work. I am thinking about trying to get a lighter one of those as well as it weighs in at about 10 kg with all the gizmos like blank cd's and cardreaders, cables, power adaptors etc. I would like to take a small printer but they are just too bulky and heavy and there is a voltage incompatibility problem with most of them as well. I take the laptop as a piece of handluggage naturally and pack some other stuff in the bag its in as well so its not a total disaster.

If anyone has tips about laptops I would be pleased to read them.

 

I am in a quandary about whether to pack the tux for Lirica - is it going to be worth it?

[garlandexcellent]

Got a roll call going for this cruise, under "roll calls, other cruiselines." Come join us folks.

 

Howie

[webdesigner]

Hello Anorak

 

10 kg for your laptop ?? Wow - that sounds really a lot, even for older models.

You probably do not need any CDs - if you want to "save" some weight (your harddrive will surely accomodate easily all pictures you will take.

A printer should be accessible at the Lirica's Internet cafe (if it is set up as HAL ships) or at any port of call Internet cafes.

 

You must be really in love with a special wine if you bring it all the way from the US. However, the 27th. Dec is a Monday and I am sure that somewhere on the way or in the port area you could find a wine shop. I know you may be concerned of the time issue as you arrive the same day in Genova, so I also believe that on the ship we will be spoiled with a nice wine menue - Italy is famous for its' white ones like Pinot Grigios, Soaves, Orvietos, Cavis de Cavis, and as a pre-dinner drink you will probably love a nice Prosecco.

If I would be concerned about weight - I would trust Italy's reputation and history of great wines. Just one bottle of wine to bring will be approx. 1 kg - so this adds up quickly.

 

Another 2 months and here we go............looking forward to meet you guys.

 

Alex