Mower Lady

It also really depends on which cruise it is, some are much more popular than others. For instance its always easy to get a bargain on the colourful coast/canarien flavour cruises as they are repeated several weeks in a row.

The adriatic ones are always popular so never go down that much in price I find.

We've just got back from our cruise, just to let you know as we were in Puerto de Rosaria on Sunday the shopping mall was closed. We strolled down the pedestrianised street to the church & discovered some traditional dancers & musicians outside the church. They were a very cheerful bunch & managed to drag up several people from the ship to join in. Not sure how often they are there though.

Also just outside the port there was a local coach tour put on which went to the sand dunes & then on to Corralejo for 20 euros each, cheaper than Thomsons excursion.

Brilliant WeeCountryMan, thats really helpful, I knew someone on here would know!:)

Do the buses run the same on Sundays?

I went to both Chichenitza & Tulum when staying at a hotel in Puerto el Carmen. Tulum is much smaller but still interesting and as its right by the sea there may be time to go on the beach. If thats the only Mayan ruins you can get to see, its worth doing.

You could maybe just go for extra leg room seats which are a much cheaper option if its leg space you need, but they do go quickly

Another consideration is how busy the ship is as we've just come back from the Dream which was full to capacity. This resulted in really slow drinks service, especially in the Theatre where it was hard enough to even get 1 drink, let alone enough to make paying for AI worthwhile.

We were on a repositioning cruise on the Spirit in April which had 4 sea days.

There was a Zumba class on those days run by a member of the show team.

It was on a tiny stage so we got in each others way a bit, especially when the ship was rocking, good fun though.

Thanks for the answers, looks like it will be a combination of going for a wander & enjoying an empty ship. Thanks joeholiday, Tomsportsguides was very helpful:)

Hello, can anyone tell me what there is to do in Civitavecchia as we go there in a few weeks & have only just come back from Rome so don't want to go there again so soon. I believe there may be a shuttle bus into the town, but might be wrong.

We were on the same cruise as you and had an outside cabin on deck 3. We also smelt oil in our cabin during the 1st night & when we woke up next morning. My OH went to reception & was told it was coming through the air con & there had been a problem in a few cabins. By the time we went back to our cabin at around 4pm, it had gone, and didn't reappear.

What we did have was a constant engine noise when sailing, but we didn't really notice it after the 1st night, in fact it helped my OH sleep as he suffers from tinitus & struggles sometimes.

Straight after sailing on the 1st 2 days, we had a really loud gushing noise in the wall by our heads, next to the port hole. It went on for 2/3 hours when we were trying to have a siesta before dinner. An engineer came and said there was a waterpipe running through the wall which went to the engine which was the noise.

We were offered a move to another cabin on deck 7, but no charge was mentioned. We decided not to & never heard the noise again.

We enjoyed the cruise, but its the 1st time we had such a bad cabin, no. 528, so suggest anyone avoids it.

We have done loads of Thomson cruises, but are now getting a bit disillusioned by the age & condition of the ships. I'm not sure if even the wonderful crew, entertainment & lovely fellow passengers can make up for that.

We seemed to on one of the few Tropical Treasures that managed to get into St Barths in January. I have to say I wasn't impressed, sounds like it would have been better to go to St Maarten. It didn't seem like a 'proper' caribbean island, just full of overpriced shops & rich french people. They obviously didn't really want us there, the price for a couple of loungers & umbrella on shell beach was 56 Euros! Needless to say we all sat on our blue Thomson beach towels instead. We did have a nice swim and wandered back via the marina to the tender boats, but it ended up being my least favourite stop on the itiniary.

Santander-I know Thomson don't go there often but its easy to get on the HO-HO bus and it takes you right out to the lovely Summer palace, beautiful sea views, lovely beaches and a tiny zoo with seals & sea lions.

I'm so jealous, have been back from Latin Gems just over a week & would be back in an instant if I could. Aruba has loads of lovely beaches. Just walk over the road from where the ship docks to the bus station & get a local bus which takes you right along the coast, past all the big hotels & there's loads of beaches. The bus drivers are really helpful & its cheap, a couple of dollars each

Curacoa, ship docks right in the middle of a lovely town, great for wandering around the market. You walk over a really great swing bridge which seems to open every 10 minutes, great to watch. We sat & had a drink in a bar overlooking the water where the ship docked- lovely.

Brindisi, Southern Italy- where shipped docked was surrounded by blocks of tatty flats. Last port of Adriatic explorer before going back to Corfu, Thomson only went there a couple of times before exchanging it for the much more lovely Kotor. Unfortunately we were on one of those 2 visits. I read before we went how awful it was before we went, so booked a Thomson excursion, good job too, the local taxi drivers looked really scarey!

There is a secure place to leave hand luggage. On the Celebration & Spirit it was in the Cinema. Each seat has a number & you are given a ticket with the number on it. There is a member of staff there, I assume they stay there the whole time. Even though its really easy & quick to do a lot of people don't seem to bother so the whole day is spent trying not to trip over other people's bags

Thank you both for that, very helpful to make up my mind. Must have misread the website, sure it said some 5/6 cabins had obstructed views!

Hello, can anyone tell me which deck has the lifeboats on Dream? I've booked deck 5/6 outside plus & just noticed that some may have obscured views? I know I can book a particular cabin to avoid this, I know its being stingy:D but don't really want to.