Another GREAT review of the Spirit Grand Med Cruise 5/19/2015

[TheCruisingBrewers]

WILL NCL Change Our Minds?

 

Background and Basics:

Much of what I would have said here was done very well previously by Carolyn (Loving my Life) in her great review that she just completed. I will try to add in some photos (though many of ours are duplicates since she and I spent quite a lot of time taking side by side shots) that I have and will try not to over duplicate them for you all. Carolyn, and her hubby Dan were great cruise buddies and Carolyn and I were well on the way to becoming lasting friends, well before the cruise.

 

It is nice to find people like that, that enrich your cruise experience. Though somewhat younger than Pete and I, they share the same love of cruises, travel and food (in NO particular order) that we do! We found early on that we love the same experiences, isn’t it grand how cruising, much like internet communities binds people together? I have to say out of the gate this is the best RC group of people I have ever sailed with and everyone got along terrifically. We had people from many parts of the US, Canada, Panama and both Australia and New Zealand. Everyone had a great time, no matter how we grouped up for excursions.

 

WHO are we?

Pete and I are from the San Diego area, in our late 50’s, early 60’s, have two grown children, who we cruised with a great deal before they grew up and moved away. Our experience as you can see is Carnival, Princess, RCI and NCL. So we have tried other lines. We also have taken significant land based trips to Great Britain in 2012 and have travelled to Hawaii many times previously. We took this cruise to celebrate our 32nd anniversary, and also as a pre-retirement vacation for Pete who will retire next year. It satisfied Pete’s bucket list for Greece and Turkey, because he is Greek, and mine for much of Italy. Besides, I owed him for the time I spent looking for my own roots in Wales and crawling through castles and cathedrals in Great Britain in 2012. I might add the driving in Great Britain thing, which was a once in a lifetime experience. I know we both got greyer doing it!

 

Should We?

Early on I waited and shopped this same Grand Med Cruise itinerary on Princess, though it was always almost $1000 more. The up side is the Island Princess is a wonderful ship and is newly refurbished and we have sailed on her before. We waited and talked and finally I started looking elsewhere, because the more I read I saw that you will spend VERY little time aboard the ship and Princesses prices NEVER dropped.

 

I started watching NCL and this cruise beginning in August last year. I started reading the boards, like many of we CC folk do and pondered. When I saw the price differences on NCL I then had a dilemma, because we had a very bad experience on an NCL cruise in Hawaii. The service was just not up to par and we felt the whole trip was sort of a joke and the only saving grace was…. You guessed it…We used the ship just to get to the new port every day.

 

We have numerous family and friends who swear by NCL and love the line, and I know NCL was challenged a bit with the edict to hire all US staff for that cruise. It is sort of sad, however, don’t you think that no US citizen would ever want to be that endearing happy happy, washy washy guy? I guess we Americans just do not accept working incredibly hard hours, being away from home and family, and working for very low wages, like the staff on ships everywhere else in the world. It is sad for us Americans, but testament to the thousands of hard working people who make our cruises clean, entertaining and delicious across all the lines.

 

It was second chance time. We booked the cruise and hoped that our friends and family and the scores of Freestyle Cruisers here are not wrong.

 

The Planning Stage

I freely admit it I am a voracious planner (this is another reason Carolyn, Dave, Nick, Gerry, Walt and Curtis and I all got along well) and I spent much of my free time, planning this cruise. We all spent a great deal of time, (Carolyn, Dave and I in the very early stages) planning, calling and researching CC and Trip advisor. We read travel boards and shared posts. We did not pick any tour company that was not well reviewed by other members here or on Trip Advisor.

 

Our best laid plans…

We booked the cruise, then the airfare (waiting for our favorite non-stop British Airways flights to go on sale). Next, I arranged pre and post hotels. There are advantages to doing this very early as I discovered in both Venice and London. Then Carolyn, Dave and I worked down the list of excursions. I think we had most of the excursion in the major ports reserved by Christmas. Once we finished the major ports, I finished the small distance travel and booked things to do in the ports we would spend pre and post time in.

 

As the roll call grew, so did the intensity of planning, filling in the open slots in our groups, and that organization then fell to me to help people find tours, recommend vendors if tours were full, or offer suggestions for them based on what they wished to do. I started a spreadsheet and it grew as the RC did, me filling in and sharing with the group as we expanded. Keeping it up was a bit of a challenge because plans changed pretty dramatically from a few weeks I had 5-8 emails each day trying to get things sorted out for people. I know Carolyn did as well and she and I emailed almost daily for months during our planning.

 

…turned into a trip of a lifetime.

I am happy to report we loved our cruise, had a fabulous time with this group and would do it again in a heartbeat! NCL was amazing and I hope I can sway others here who may have had that same experience we did in Hawaii.

 

I am not going to re-post information regarding which tours we went on, if we were along with Carolyn, that information exists in her review. Please see it for tour descriptions and pricing. Here is a link to it!

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2217080

 

I will share my opinions and thoughts, and of course any differences here. Sit right back and you'll read a tale....And it does not end up like Gilligan's tale I promise!

 

Nancy -One half of The Cruising Brewers

[Loving My Life]

Hi Nancy! I'm sitting back and anxiously waiting for the next segment of your review. I just spent a half hour watching Nick's wonderful slide show. Check it out if you haven't already!

[tmackel]

Reliving our Med cruise through you! Thanks!

[TheCruisingBrewers]

I really appreciated yours, it gave me lots of inspiration along with all that planning.

 

Now if I could just not HAVE to go to work I would get it done faster! LOL

 

I should have some more for this evening!

 

Nancy

[TheCruisingBrewers]

The Planned Itinerary

 

Much has been said for this itinerary and even my well-travelled work colleagues ( I work for the CPAP company ResMed, so many of my work friends travel back and forth to Sydney, Leone and Munich frequently) sigh in jealousy at where I went in just a bit shy of 3 weeks of travel.

 

It seems to be a nearly perfect plan for seeing many countries and well known popular sites in a pretty rapid fire succession of days. Coupled with a planned pre or post stop in Paris like Carolyn and Dave did, or in London, like Pete and I did, it gave us a chance to unwind a bit at the end of this sometimes frantic itinerary. We explored Venice canals and islands, drank wine and chatted with an exceedingly charming Italian man, and wandered London on iconic red double decker buses. I do have to admit another sea day would have been welcomed to break up the pace a bit. I had to come back to rest!

 

Here is our plan for the trip and the tour operators used:

 

June 15 Flight out Nonstop San Diego to Heathrow

June 16 - Travel Heathrow to Barcelona

June 17 - Barcelona – Hotel Arc De Las Ramblas - Hop off Hop on Bus

May 18 - Barcelona – Barcelona Day Tours

May 19 – To the Norwegian Spirit. Unofficial after muster meet up

May 20 – Toulon – Provence Wine Tours Cassis and tour

May 21 – Cinque Terre with NCL

May 22 – Rome – Rome in Limo - Rome Highlights with Vatican tour and guide

May 23 – Naples – Rome in Limo – Positano, Sorrento and Pompei with guide

May 24 – Sea Day – At last! Meet and Greet

May 25 – Mykonos – On our own

May 26 – Istanbul - Istanbul Day Tours

May 27 – Ephesus – On our own in Town- Half a day’s rest

May 28 – Athens - Private Greek Tour Athens and Cape Souion Tour

May 29 – Sea Day

May 30 – Venice Offbeat and Bar tour with Alessandro Shezziti

May 31 – Spirit disembarkation Best Western Hotel Olimpia - Murano and Burano on our own

June 1 – Flight to Heathrow - Millennium Bailey Hotel

June 2 – Hop off Hop On Bus in London

June 3 – Flight home Heathrow to San Diego

 

June 15/16- Travel days-

 

I did take Friday off for last minute packing and organizing, which is something I usually do, since it is too hard to wash, clean and pack while working full time! I also got to spent time as I was printing and organizing all my paperwork snuggling my two cats. I was a bit worried about them, since we had never left them in their young lives and I really was not sure how they would do at such a long absence. My daughter’s fiancée’s mother and step dad were covering as house parents and chicken watcher. They picked me up then Pete at his job on our way to the airport. It is always better to wrangle my husband, who is not fond of flying, into a jet after work when he is already tired.

 

 

We love British Airways and their terrific customer service, and our nonstop flight to London Heathrow went without a hitch. We discovered this flight in 2012 when we flew to London before. Yes it is a very long flight from San Diego, but overnight is easy and you arrive in London at 3, with plenty of daylight to navigate there. I waited for these tickets about 3 months and bought them as soon as I saw a American/British Airways sale. I am sure shorter hops would have been cheaper, but this was a request from Pete, so worth the bit extra for his happiness.

 

We hopped onto the transfer bus from Terminal 5 to Terminal 3 and then boarded our London to Barcelona flight without problem. The sheer size of Heathrow is evident when you take one of these buses. It is enormous and makes Dallas which is a huge airport acreage-wise look tiny in comparison. I have to admit here I was rather tired by this time. Unlike Pete I can never sleep in a plane, so I had been up since 5 am Friday morning!

 

NOTES ON HEATHROW- They have a great website which will easily explain what sounds like a very complicated process, has maps, an app to help you sort out arrival and departure terminals, and even a massive shopping mall at the airport! Another small thing… It has POWERFUL Xray systems. The reason I know this is I have 4 metal pins in one hip from a horse riding accident and I have never set off the alarm before. In fact, I did not in 2012 either when I went through before. But this time I did and it took searching and hand scanning several times to sort out. I never am offended by this, better to have everyone safe, but it is weird having a strange lady “frisk” you.

 

We Made It!

 

We arrived in Barcelona at 10 pm, a bit bleary eyed and worn out, collected our luggage and wandered outside to meet our ride, Roman Liort and Pressicar. He was waiting exactly where he said, all finely dressed and professional, and led us to his shining van for our trip to our hotel. He was wonderful, along the way and chatted with us about Barcelona and the sights we passed along the way and dropped us in front of our hotel. I must admit I was likely not the best conservationist at this time. In fact I was shocked I could form sentences!

 

I found Roman, looking on Trip Advisor while I was shopping for Airport to Hotel transportation. He was a wonderful guide and also provides private guiding and tours for this in Barcelona so please consider him for this. He has a terrific website and answers his emails promptly. Pete and I will definitely use him again as a tour guide should we ever be in Barcelona again.

 

NOTES – “The Dreaded Barcelona Pickpockets”- I know many of you considering or having been it Barcelona have heard this and read those posts, we all do. One of the primary reasons I used Roman was because we were arriving late at night, our hotel is way down on Las Ramblas and so would mean navigating down with all our luggage and with us both being pretty tired. It just seemed safer to me, having read the posts on pick pockets and for that matter being in a strange city at night. . I still though do not regret spending a bit more for door to door service. In hindsight, Barcelona was never a problem for us, we were prepared and watchful and had the appropriate equipment to protect our belonging and cash (money belt, locking purse and backpack).

 

We checked into our hotel room at Arc Las Ramblas, which I must say was probably as small or smaller than our cruise ship cabin! It was so small I could not get a decent photo even! It was spotlessly clean and pretty quiet and a perfect “cave” to sleep off of our time zone induced fatigue. We were so tired it really did not matter at this point, and as Pete often says, we are not buying it, just staying a few nights.

[TheCruisingBrewers]

In Search of a Cup of Joe

 

We woke late around noon, disappointed we had slept though breakfast, but refreshed from the good sleep. Determined to get out and get some sun we headed out, to Las Ramblas in search of coffee and breakfast. We headed north east toward the Playa Catyluna where we would catch our Hop on Hop off bus. Las Ramblas was everything I had read, vibrant, busting and it’s tree-lined path dotted with restaurants dotted to places to eat for touristas like ourselves.

 

 

We finally settled on this lovely little bakery called Escriba about 4 blocks up, where we had a good latte and a continental style breakfast of pastries, juice and toasted ham and cheese. I did not get a single good picture inside, but here is one for reference. They had amazing looking desserts and maroons in every color you could imagine

 

[TheCruisingBrewers]

Touring the City

 

Once filled we wandered up the street, stopping here and there along the way for souvenir shopping and to admire the views. We finally reached Playa Catyluna and found our bus for the Hop off and Hop On tour. This was a really great way to get a general idea of the layout of the City, get some sun and fresh air and wander where our feet would take us. On the top of the bus is a great place for photos.

 

 

 

 

 

[TheCruisingBrewers]

Here are a few more shots...

 

 

 

 

Trying Tapas

 

We did not get off to look around much because we had an official tour set up for the second day, but finally about 4 pm, with our stomachs rumbling, we got off at the port to walk around. It is lovely and busy lined with cruise ships and ferries. The Epic was there docked. We had never seen it before in person, it looks enormous! We walked for another hour and then settled at Tapas Tapas with a shady water-side table and tried some calamari, potato tapas and a paella, chased down with some refreshing Spanish cerveza (beer).

 

 

 

With our stomachs full and the time zones reminding us our bodies were still out of kilter, we headed back to the hotel, for some more sleep.

[blan2]

Thank you for sharing your adventure with us......I look forward to reading your review.

[TheCruisingBrewers]

Thank you Blan2!

[juanita1767]

Can't wait to hear more on this review.

[TheCruisingBrewers]

Sorry everyone a bit under the weather from a nasty post cruise cold. I will post more when I feel better.

[Loving My Life]

Nancy, feel better soon!! I will keep an eye out for the next installment when you're better.

Edited June 15, 2015 by Loving My Life

[KW_Cruisers]

A great start for your review with photos & details.

 

Strange that we were both hacking and felt our sinusitis was just allergies or a cold at first. It seems that many on our Norwegian Jewel cruise, ending in May also found themselves with colds, allergies or sinusitis.

 

Anyway, when you feel better, hope we can find your very interesting review. Carolyn's was great too & we enjoyed reading all about your adventures, as we have now booked Spirit for May 2016.

 

John & Connie in Houston burb of (KW_Cruisers) Kingwood.

shifferds@gmail.com

 

We didn't have problems on Pride of American in 2014, but did find out how to navigate around management, who seemed to be the problem, not really the crew. I still remember asking the old lady manager to step aside, as our waiter was doing his job, when she was insisting that we were not to be able to sit at the same table, have the same waiter to bring our hors d'oeuvres and drinks on a daily basis - It's just not the way it's supposed to be (her job was to make us have a terrible dinner, while our waiter continued his excellent work each evening in the dining room). On the first day, when having lunch in the main dining room on POA, he told us they would have lobster that evening, but not announce it, so we saw him for dinner & it was the only evening for lobster.

 

It really is just a moving hotel, without a casino, not much in the way of entertainment after hula dancers become tiresome, but we always had a nice clean balcony cabin and a good breakfast and dinner, with our car waiting for us at each port. A great way to see Hawaii, especially compared to flying to each island, then finding the hotel every couple of days. The cruise cost less & was less hassle than flying on 4 flights & having 3 different rooms in addition to our Oahu flight & room.

 

Guess Americans are just not as patronizing or condescending as those from 3rd World countries. After all, those from the US have become accustomed to the lie, cheat and steal government policies, but don't accept them as well as other nationalities and occasionally stand up for what is right. Some countries just tolerate our ways for the financial benefits we bring them, as sad as that truth is to believe. I always wonder what these healthier, poorer, well-disciplined crew members think when they are serving the wealthier, larger, less fit pax from US, Canada, Australia & Europe.

 

Our review of our 29 day cruise just posted on CC site:

http://www.cruisecritic.com/memberreviews/memberreview.cfm?EntryID=505877

[flapbreaker]

I am curious, did you ever see a price drop in your cabin price from the time of booking? I am booked on this same itinerary for August 2016 so I'm on the look out for any sort of price drop but I doubt I'll see one. Also, maybe I missed it but what type of cabin did you book and did you like it?

[flapbreaker]

Another question.

 

I was trying to look at availability for the Hotel Arc De Las Ramblas for August 2016 but looks like it's booked all off next summer, in fact a lot of hotels there are booked. Did you find this as well. I'm wondering if their schedule isn't really opened up yet.

[TheCruisingBrewers]

I did not have much trouble finding hotels, though we originally wanted to stay more toward the top of Las Ramblas so I would definitely send them an email to inquire. Also check multiple sources for hotels as sometimes there are really great discounts on on but not another.

 

As To the price drops yes watch your prices. All cruise lines will discount fares during wave season Dec-Mar and then again check before your have to finalize the payment. For us fares dropped just before and many people took cabin upgrades. I did even because my inside price got us an ocean view. We loved the location of our cabin but there were some quirks about it too. I will explain in my next post!

[lanceholt]

The Planned Itinerary

 

Much has been said for this itinerary and even my well-travelled work colleagues ( I work for the CPAP company ResMed, so many of my work friends travel back and forth to Sydney, Leone and Munich frequently) sigh in jealousy at where I went in just a bit shy of 3 weeks of travel.

 

It seems to be a nearly perfect plan for seeing many countries and well known popular sites in a pretty rapid fire succession of days. Coupled with a planned pre or post stop in Paris like Carolyn and Dave did, or in London, like Pete and I did, it gave us a chance to unwind a bit at the end of this sometimes frantic itinerary. We explored Venice canals and islands, drank wine and chatted with an exceedingly charming Italian man, and wandered London on iconic red double decker buses. I do have to admit another sea day would have been welcomed to break up the pace a bit. I had to come back to rest!

 

Here is our plan for the trip and the tour operators used:

 

June 15 Flight out Nonstop San Diego to Heathrow

June 16 - Travel Heathrow to Barcelona

June 17 - Barcelona – Hotel Arc De Las Ramblas - Hop off Hop on Bus

May 18 - Barcelona – Barcelona Day Tours

May 19 – To the Norwegian Spirit. Unofficial after muster meet up

May 20 – Toulon – Provence Wine Tours Cassis and tour

May 21 – Cinque Terre with NCL

May 22 – Rome – Rome in Limo - Rome Highlights with Vatican tour and guide

May 23 – Naples – Rome in Limo – Positano, Sorrento and Pompei with guide

May 24 – Sea Day – At last! Meet and Greet

May 25 – Mykonos – On our own

May 26 – Istanbul - Istanbul Day Tours

May 27 – Ephesus – On our own in Town- Half a day’s rest

May 28 – Athens - Private Greek Tour Athens and Cape Souion Tour

May 29 – Sea Day

May 30 – Venice Offbeat and Bar tour with Alessandro Shezziti

May 31 – Spirit disembarkation Best Western Hotel Olimpia - Murano and Burano on our own

June 1 – Flight to Heathrow - Millennium Bailey Hotel

June 2 – Hop off Hop On Bus in London

June 3 – Flight home Heathrow to San Diego

 

June 15/16- Travel days-

 

I did take Friday off for last minute packing and organizing, which is something I usually do, since it is too hard to wash, clean and pack while working full time! I also got to spent time as I was printing and organizing all my paperwork snuggling my two cats. I was a bit worried about them, since we had never left them in their young lives and I really was not sure how they would do at such a long absence. My daughter’s fiancée’s mother and step dad were covering as house parents and chicken watcher. They picked me up then Pete at his job on our way to the airport. It is always better to wrangle my husband, who is not fond of flying, into a jet after work when he is already tired.

 

 

We love British Airways and their terrific customer service, and our nonstop flight to London Heathrow went without a hitch. We discovered this flight in 2012 when we flew to London before. Yes it is a very long flight from San Diego, but overnight is easy and you arrive in London at 3, with plenty of daylight to navigate there. I waited for these tickets about 3 months and bought them as soon as I saw a American/British Airways sale. I am sure shorter hops would have been cheaper, but this was a request from Pete, so worth the bit extra for his happiness.

 

We hopped onto the transfer bus from Terminal 5 to Terminal 3 and then boarded our London to Barcelona flight without problem. The sheer size of Heathrow is evident when you take one of these buses. It is enormous and makes Dallas which is a huge airport acreage-wise look tiny in comparison. I have to admit here I was rather tired by this time. Unlike Pete I can never sleep in a plane, so I had been up since 5 am Friday morning!

 

NOTES ON HEATHROW- They have a great website which will easily explain what sounds like a very complicated process, has maps, an app to help you sort out arrival and departure terminals, and even a massive shopping mall at the airport! Another small thing… It has POWERFUL Xray systems. The reason I know this is I have 4 metal pins in one hip from a horse riding accident and I have never set off the alarm before. In fact, I did not in 2012 either when I went through before. But this time I did and it took searching and hand scanning several times to sort out. I never am offended by this, better to have everyone safe, but it is weird having a strange lady “frisk” you.

 

We Made It!

 

We arrived in Barcelona at 10 pm, a bit bleary eyed and worn out, collected our luggage and wandered outside to meet our ride, Roman Liort and Pressicar. He was waiting exactly where he said, all finely dressed and professional, and led us to his shining van for our trip to our hotel. He was wonderful, along the way and chatted with us about Barcelona and the sights we passed along the way and dropped us in front of our hotel. I must admit I was likely not the best conservationist at this time. In fact I was shocked I could form sentences!

 

I found Roman, looking on Trip Advisor while I was shopping for Airport to Hotel transportation. He was a wonderful guide and also provides private guiding and tours for this in Barcelona so please consider him for this. He has a terrific website and answers his emails promptly. Pete and I will definitely use him again as a tour guide should we ever be in Barcelona again.

 

NOTES – “The Dreaded Barcelona Pickpockets”- I know many of you considering or having been it Barcelona have heard this and read those posts, we all do. One of the primary reasons I used Roman was because we were arriving late at night, our hotel is way down on Las Ramblas and so would mean navigating down with all our luggage and with us both being pretty tired. It just seemed safer to me, having read the posts on pick pockets and for that matter being in a strange city at night. . I still though do not regret spending a bit more for door to door service. In hindsight, Barcelona was never a problem for us, we were prepared and watchful and had the appropriate equipment to protect our belonging and cash (money belt, locking purse and backpack).

 

We checked into our hotel room at Arc Las Ramblas, which I must say was probably as small or smaller than our cruise ship cabin! It was so small I could not get a decent photo even! It was spotlessly clean and pretty quiet and a perfect “cave” to sleep off of our time zone induced fatigue. We were so tired it really did not matter at this point, and as Pete often says, we are not buying it, just staying a few nights.

 

How did you contact Roman at Pressicar and how much did he charge for transport from the airport to the hotel? Thanks

[WallyOC]

Hi Nancy and Pete...good to see you made it home OK. The QM2 was a whole different vibe than Norwegian. Pleasant enough, quiet enough, slow enough to re engage with the real world as we traveled to NY. Only one sunny day out of 7 though. Home at last and reliving the trip with friends and family (jealous). It was a real pleasure to meet you and all the CC participants. NORWEGIAN IS OUTSTANDING . Still have not the courage to step on the scale...wallyO' walt & kathy o'connor

[TheCruisingBrewers]

Hey Walt welcome back to land I am dying to hear how the second round on Spirit and the Queen was!

 

Pete and I have both been sick with post cruise colds but otherwise have reverted to our day to day life here as working folk.

 

I will drop you an email to chat too but wanted to say how much fun we had that lazy afternoon with you and Kathy. We really had a great group hope we sail again one day with some of you!

 

Nancy

Edited June 23, 2015 by TheCruisingBrewers

[TheCruisingBrewers]

Sorry I missed your question lanceholt. I saw Roman;s;r ating on Trip Advisor. Search for is like this:

 

Pressicat Limo Tours

 

He charged 69 euro plus tax, which was close to the taxi rate, and he was everything his numerous posts said on Trip Advisor. Just really impeccable dependable services, especially since it was late for us, we had been up for a long time, and needed door to door service.

[Tyskie]

Looking forward to the rest of your review - loved Carolyn's :D

We cruise NCL frequently and yes, we could have had a better deal but choose Princess because I like the itinerary better. We'll be having 3 sea days and only 1 day in Turkey.

 

We had a good experience with POA but went with the idea that it was a floating hotel. The staff we encountered was amazing & personable.

 

Hope you are feeling better, that dead air on the planes will do it every time!

[wardwhitty]

So excited to hear more about your cruise. We sail the Spirit this Thanksgiving although not in the Med we are still very interested in the ship, rooms, crew, food, favorite spots etc. Thank you in advance for taking the time to do your review.

[kate1970]

My husband & I are going on the reverse itinerary at the same time in 2016. We've never been to Europe. What was the weather like for your trip in 2015? I've read the summer months can be brutally hot but wondering if it will be cool (jackets/sweaters for evening) or if it will be too warm for that. Thank you.

[KW_Cruisers]

We'll be on the Spirit from April 23 to May 19, 2016 - so if you find out anything interesting about weather or other things about the ship, ports, etc., please let us know. :cool:

 

My husband & I are going on the reverse itinerary at the same time in 2016. We've never been to Europe. What was the weather like for your trip in 2015? I've read the summer months can be brutally hot but wondering if it will be cool (jackets/sweaters for evening) or if it will be too warm for that. Thank you.