A HAL'er Goes to Sea

[Taxguy77]

The only inclusive cruise we have been on was 10 days on Royal Clipper, part of a "Presidents Cruise" 14 day package. The lack of a casino plus free wine with dinner saved a lot of $$$.

It was the most expensive 2 weeks we've spent, and worth every penny!

[Randyk47]

I see no reason that would be a problem. While it's true this is a more "formal" cruising format it's far from being buttoned-down. What is available to do is somewhat itinerary driven so our options on a early spring cruise in the Med didn't include too much adventureous stuff that doesn't mean some brave souls didn't venture in that direction. The tour staff on board is helpful and it's not all about booking through them. and they'llYou want to do something on your own and ask them how you might in a port point you in the right direction.[/QUOTE]

 

What a diference from our experience on HAL!

 

It was quite different. We had planned our cruise pretty tightly using a combination of ship and privately arranged tours so we didn't do much with them. However we did notice that the cabs in Isanbul were small and quite frankly we had a lot of luggage to cover basically 18 days away from home. We were traveling with another couple and actually talked about taking three cabs. The ladies would go in one cab together and the guys would split up and take a cab each. We figured we could get all our stuff to the hotel that way. In passing we decided to stop by the shore desk and ask about transfers or other options. Their suggestion was a limo service with capacity for our bags. They arranged it and we walked off the ship and right to a Mercedes limo van with plenty of space. Sure there was a charge for the limo van but not extraordinary and well worth it. All done with a smile and a can-do attitude. I guess you can provide that level of service when dealing with 1/5 the number of passengers on a HAL R or S class ship.

[Randyk47]

I finally got around to writing my formal review of our recent Wind cruise. Let me say up front that this was our first cruise with Silversea so there are probably aspects of the ship and the line that I didn't experience or cover in my review. For what it's worth: http://www.cruisecritic.com/memberreviews/memberreview.cfm?EntryID=100978

[PathfinderEss]

Thanks for taking the time to post your review of your wonderful cruise. Really enjoyed the read.