13 Days, 8 Ports and One New Ship: Nicole721's FULL PICTORIAL Horizon Review

[Nicole721]

Day 6: Sea Day

 

We have a formula for sea days that works well for us.

 

We wake up, we grab breakfast (or coffee), we lay out at the pool, we brunch, we shower, we play trivia, we do tea, we nap, we get ready for dinner, we see a show, we go to the bar or the shops and we go to bed.

 

It’s a formula that’s worked well for us, leaving us enough time to laze around and relax but still experience different parts of the ship and its entertainment. When we sailed to the Baltics last year, it kind of broke our formula a little only because it was warm-ish (just not enough to lay out on a deck chair or swim!), but we only had a sea day or two anyways with our port-heavy itinerary.

 

We knew going into this cruise that for, at least, the first half of it, swimming and sunning would be out. The forecast never creeped above a high of 65 degrees and hovered in the 60-61 degree range as we inched closer. So instead of packing swimsuits and cover ups and maxi dresses, I was packing sweats and loungewear. And instead of planning for where to grab a deck chair, we we were planning how long we could sleep in, when we could schedule naps and when the best time to snag a laundry machine could be.

 

 

Riveting, I know. But as much as I like to run to the top of rooftops and proclaim myself Miss Adventure, Miss I’ll-Sleep-When-I’m-Dead-Or-On-The-Flight-Home, in order to be my best self for the best parts of this cruise, I needed rest. My body was clearly telling me I needed to slow things down – I slept through just about all of our bus rides on our Three Countries One Day tour and it took two days for my ears to pop afterwards.

 

Three of my favorite ports were ahead of me the following three days in Florence, Rome and Naples. Following that was stops in five new ports – Croatia, Corfu, Malta, Sicily and Sardinia. I decided I’d rather slow it down on the first sea day than go hard, feel worse and miss something I was looking forward to so much.

 

Mother Nature seemed to agree with my choice – when I woke up and looked out the window, the seas were choppy, the skies were gray and the weather didn’t show any temp higher than 58 degrees.

 

 

We grabbed a quick breakfast up on the Lido deck, where I was finally reunited with the long lost love of my life, the arepas from the Blue Iguana Cantina. Since many of you are new and might be reading my cruise journal for the first time, lets get acquainted: my name is Nicole, I’m a Cancer/Leo cusper (and live up to just about every stereotype of it) and the breakfast arepas from the Blue Iguana Cantina are my mother effing jam. Like if I were on death row and the warden was preparing my final meal, they’d be on the menu. Most people don’t know they exist (or what they are) and I’m here to tell you that they are missing out. It’s like smooth, melty cheese in between two sweet corn cakes. 100% delish (especially with some salsa verde on the side for dipping). And I haven’t had arepas since…New Year’s cruise of 2017? On the Sunshine, I think? Because we did the Baltics on NCL and they don’t have arepas and neither the Paradise nor the Splendor have a Blue Iguana Cantina, so it must have been January 2017 – 15 months. And maybe it was the new ship thing or the 15 months thing, but the arepas never tasted better than they did on our first sea day morning here.

 

((Did I really just write 223 words about arepas? Whoooooooboy))

 

[Nicole721]

After breakfast, we headed to the first Fun Aboard Fun Ashore presentation by CD Mike, which covered the first three ports on our itinerary: Livorno, Civitavecchia and Naples. We’d already been to all three of those ports twice each so we’re fairly well-versed in the port details, but we wanted to hear if there were any other details or recommendations since we hadn’t booked our tours yet for Livorno or Civitavecchia. And while we ultimately booked the tours we originally planned on, I was glad we held off – some of the sold out tours were available again on board, as well as a few tours that hadn’t been available for presale, so we had more options open to us by not booking ahead of time.

 

 

After the presentation, we popped back to the room to discover that it was being serviced, so we wandered around, catching the tail end of the cooking demo in the lobby. I don’t know what they were cooking, but it smelled so good!

 

 

We ultimately ended up back upstairs at the Lido Marketplace to make some tea because, well, it was cold and I wasn’t feeling great and tea is supposed to be good for both of those things. I’ve always found the Lido Marketplace to be a good sitting place, even when it’s not a meal time. Maybe not if I’m craving quiet, but it’s nice to be around other people, people watch, talk, mingle, drink tea (…spill tea…). And though we weren’t hungry for lunch, we took a gander at the offerings to find that they were pretty different from the ones we’d recently sailed with. More of the options in the Lido Marketplace were Americana comfort food – think fried cheese curds, chicken wings, spinach artichoke dip and a top your own loaded home fries station. Oh, and the cakes weren’t a one-day thing. It seems that onboard the Horizon, the Sweet Spot is a cake station during lunch only, with no less than five options. I wasn’t hungry for lunch, but I did steal a bite of a green tea checkerboard cake and it was just as good as it looked.

 

 

 

Once we were confident Marlin had enough time to service our cabin, we headed downstairs to nap, shower and start our laundry. After 12 hours of flying, three days in Barcelona and two on the ship, we wanted to knock some laundry out early instead of letting it pile up. We weren’t the only ones with that idea, it seemed – the Laundromat was packed.

[Nicole721]

Later on, we left our napping cocoon for a Q&A with John Heald, former cruise director and current Carnival Brand Ambassador slash social media superstar (in the cruising world, anyways!). And much like you’d expect with anything John was present for, it was full of double entendres, self-effacing humor and some dry, harsh truths.

 

 

The session ran a little over, so we ducked out for tea time. Tea time is one of my favorite Carnival sea day traditions, but the experience is consistently, well, inconsistent. Sometimes, the service is top notch, and others, you can barely get a server to bring you a pot of water. This time fell a little in between, but to be fair, it was the first tea service onboard. The servers were incredibly friendly (and generous with the macarons!) and they brought back the live music with a string duo playing classical tunes live in the dining room, but it was so packed and busy that while we were lucky enough to get consistent attention from the staff, others could barely get a tea bag or hot water. They’ll get there. I believe in them.

 

 

 

After tea time, we headed back to the room to start getting ready for our first formal night (where a plate of goodies was waiting for us on the desk). That second bathroom really came in handy when we were all trying to get our makeup done! One person at the desk, one in the bathroom, one on the couch/table. While we were primping, we checked the dining menus on the FunHub app and since nothing looked incredible or new, we made a reservation for Cucina del Capitano instead and headed off to the lobby for a round of obligatory atrium pics in our formal wear.

 

[Nicole721]

We all have different opinions on Carnival’s alternative dining options. Ji Ji is, hands down, my favorite. I love them all, but if I had to choose a meal at just one, it’d probably be Ji Ji. Stephanie – her favorite rotates amongst the three of them depending on where she’s dined the most recently and how wow’ed she was, but Mom’s favorite is now and has been for years, Cucina del Capitano. And much like the steakhouse, it had recently undergone a makeover, with a revamped menu that removed a lot of old favorites, including the spaghetti carbonara, the bistec alla griglia, the tiramisu and the cannoli. What’s an Italian restaurant without tiramisu?

We arrived right on time for our 6:30 PM reservation and were seated immediately at a high top near the kitchen, as the restaurant was at capacity for the slot. I can’t speak any higher of the service we received. The servers were not only efficient, but so friendly, and that was a trend we saw throughout. I’m not sure if they chose the best of the best to launch this ship, or if it was excitement for a new contract on a new ship, but I’ve never seen a crew in such high spirits and so consistently friendly.

 

 

And while we weren’t sure how we’d feel about the new menus (RIP, bread board and whipped ricotta), everything we ordered not only tasted good, but was plated beautifully. It was like they took Cucina del Capitano, made it more authentic, upped the quality and the presentation and best of all, kept the prices the same. Oh, and the biscotti I had for dessert? To. Die. For.

 

New Bread Plank

 

Antipasti

 

Il Capitano’s Signature Arancini

 

House-Made Burrata

 

Il Capitano’s Favorite Insalata di Rucola

 

Pasta Patate e Provola di Rosaria

 

Costina di Manzo con Porcini

 

Pollo Parmigiana della Cucina

[Nicole721]

Fingerling Potatoes

 

Spaghetti

 

Melanzane

 

Crostada di Mele con Crema al Caramello

 

Agrumi | Torta al Miele e Polenta | Sorbetto di Limone

 

Biscotti al Cioccolato con Sale Marino | Caffe Gelato

[Nicole721]

We grabbed a cup of tea in the Lido Marketplace before heading back to the room to change before we had to grab seats for a Playlist Production Show of Amor Cubano, a show we’ve seen more times than we can count at this point. This Playlist Cast that launched the Horizon is so talented, so locked in with each other, it was like watching a master class on how to execute a show we’ve already seen so many times. We recognized many of them from the Vista, a few from other ships we’ve sailed on, but props to them – they were truly fantastic.

 

 

 

 

I was ready to pass out and crawl into bed after the show. Between not feeling the best and the motion of the waves rolling beneath us, I was exhausted even though I was fully rested. Mom and Stephanie wanted to look at some of the shops, though, and we discovered that there were MORE shops on deck 4 that we hadn’t realized in our walk throughs, including an Inaugural Pop Up Shop that only has inaugural themed merchandise. Stephanie and I contemplated some inaugural sweatshirts, but decided we’d wait to see how much money we blew through in Florence before buying more stuff we didn’t need.

 

 

 

Our tour had an early meeting time the following AM, so we meticulously chose our outfits, laid out our shoes and packed our bags. We’d dock in Livorno bright and early, and even though the forecast said rain, I was so beyond ready to marvel at my old pal, Il Duomo.

 

[Nicole721]

Day 7: Livorno, Italy

 

There’s this scene in Eat, Pray, Love that has always resonated with me.

 

I used to have this appetite for food, for my life, and now it’s just gone. I want to go some place where I can marvel at something. Language. Gelato. Spaghetti. Something.

 

And then she books a flight to Florence and begins to rediscover the vigor for life she had been missing.

 

Every time I’m in Florence, it’s this big, all-encompassing sensation of wonder that resonates from the top of my head to the tips of my toes, dropping my jaw to the ground and my eyes towards the sky. Florence reminds me of how small I am, and how big and vastly beautiful the rest of the world is outside of my little Windy City bubble.

 

Livorno was the first port of call on our itinerary, a gateway to not only Florence, but nearby Pisa, Cinque Terre and the region of Tuscany. We’d been twice prior. The first time, we did a guided tour of Florence. The second time, we did a combo Florence and Pisa On Your Own tour. And this time? Just Florence. Because no matter how many times we’ve visited or how many hours we have on each visit, it’s never been enough. I’m not sure it ever could be.

 

 

Our tour was scheduled to meet in the Liquid Lounge at 7:40 AM, which meant an ungodly 6:00 AM wake up call (vacation what?!). On port days when the Lido Marketplace can get oppressively crowded, the Horizon also has a lesser known breakfast spot: Ocean Plaza. We picked up on it on the Vista and were pleased to find it on the Horizon, as well. The options may not be as expansive, but it covers all of the staples (eggs, meats, potatoes, baked goods, hot and cold cereals, yogurts and fruits) with none of the lines.

 

 

We booked our Florence On Your Own tour directly through the ship. We probably could have made our way into Florence by ourselves, but after our experience of doing Stockholm on our own the year before (losing out on time because our train was running so late, missing our intended train back because we couldn’t figure out how to get through the automated ticketing gates…as much as we travel, we definitely aren’t immune to those moments!), we just felt a little safer doing it through the ship. Our tickets noted a 7:40 AM departure time from the Liquid Lounge and we headed over around 7:20 AM, only to find a line that wrapped from the Liquid Lounge all the way back to the casino on Deck 4, and to be told that we were too early to enter the line. They did finally let us enter the line around 7:30 AM, and it moved quickly as we were handed our stickers and guided to the inside of the lounge to wait for our tour number to be called. We were escorted down the stairs from Deck 4 to Deck 0, scanned out and directed to meet our bus outside the terminal.

 

 

 

At the Port of Livorno, there are a handful of stalls inside the terminal building offering tours, car rentals and driver services, but not any shops. Just outside of there is where most tours will meet, and we quickly found our bus and waited for the rest of our group to follow suit. Our transfer to Florence was on a large, comfortable motor coach that was immaculately clean and even had a Nespresso machine onboard (which we didn’t get to use but still found it funny enough to note!). And we waited. And we waited. Our guide, Isadora, would function less of a guide and more of a host guiding us through our transfer and making sure we knew when we needed to meet back and where. Isadora made an announcement that 10 people were missing from the counts the ship had given her and the ship had not cleared us to depart as a result, and we ended up delayed by about a half hour as a result. I’m not sure where the other eight people were (or if they existed or cancelled), but two of them were sent onto the wrong tour bus by the Carnival Shore Excursions team and, well, needless to say, there were a few angry people on the bus that were upset that they were delayed. It’s unfortunate but not really a ton you can do about it, you know? Get me to the duomo!

 

[Nicole721]

The drive to Florence from Livorno takes about an hour and a half, depending on traffic. Isadora gave highlights, directions and tips and I took a nap because bus motion makes me sleepy. When I woke up, we were crossing the Arno River, where the bus shortly thereafter would drop us off and Isadora led us on the short walk to the Piazza del Santa Croce, which would be the main site closest to our meeting point.

 

 

 

 

We were set free to explore on our own around 10:30 AM, and given a meeting time of 4:15 PM, giving us just under six hours to do whatever we wanted. We collectively had three priorities as a family: handbag shopping, photo snapping and pasta. And somehow, six hours didn’t feel like enough. Florence is a rabbit hole to my own proverbial wonderland. I hop in, my world shifts in a haze of people, art and the smell of tannin leather and I come out on the other side feeling like no time has passed at all.

 

 

 

[Nicole721]

The forecast for the day called for heavy rain, and we felt a few drops as we were leaving Piazza del Santa Croce, but after that, though the skies were dark and cloudy, not a single drop fell until we were leaving later in the afternoon. Incredibly fortuitous, too, because our plans for the day by and large involved wandering around outside. We could have booked tickets to the Uffizi Gallery or one of the many other museums, but whenever I’m in Florence, I just want to be in the presence of those larger than life monuments, and to feel that heavy set wonder.

 

 

We started the way we do every time we have free time in Florence: we pick a street, any street, and just start walking. The street we chose led us to the Piazza della Signoria and the Palazzo Vecchio, where a replica of Michelangelo’s David stands in the same place the original once stood. The square, though crowded in the traditional sense, was less so than we’ve seen it in the past, and if the weather was good for nothing else, it kept the crowds manageable for the day.

 

 

 

[Nicole721]

Nearby was the Loggia del Lanzi, an outdoor gallery featuring Renaissance-era sculptures, including my favorite, Cellini’s Persus with the Head of Medusa. Walking through the gallery is free of charge and no reservations are needed.

 

 

 

After the Palazzo Vecchio and the Loggia del Lanzi, we walked back towards the Arno River to see the Ponte Vecchio, considered by some to be the most beautiful bridge in the world. I’m more partial to the Golden Gate Bridge, but the Ponte Vecchio, with it’s colorful windows and stone archways, is such a beautiful site. One of these days, we might make it across the bridge, but this time, we just settled for admiring it from the banks of the river.

 

 

 

[Nicole721]

We crossed back towards the town, through the crowds in line at the Uffizi Gallery, until we reached my favorite spot in Florence, Il Duomo di Firenze and the Florence Cathedral. When I got home from our first trip to Florence, I came across a picture I took at the duomo, this big, imposing structure, and what struck me about it was just how small everyone looked in comparison to this big cathedral. In some ways, it reminded me of how small we all are to the world around us and the magnitude of the beauty within it. Every time I’m at the duomo, I just stand there and marvel at it. I stare. For minutes. I’d probably have been there for hours if Stephanie and Mom weren’t starving for lunch and telling me to wrap it up. It’s just so…big and elaborate and beautiful, and how fortunate was I to not only experience it more than once, but to be able to revel in it and experience it in person at all?

 

 

The one thing we didn’t do right by Florence was adequately preparing a Google Map of places to eat or shop before we arrived (which I do for just about every trip I take – except for, apparently, this one!), so as we left the duomo in search of lunch, we were randomly turning down streets to see what we’d find. This might be why we never have enough time in Florence – we never have an actual plan for Florence outside of planning for the time I’ll spend slack-jawed in front of the duomo.

 

 

By the time we got to the Piazza della Repubblica, Stephanie was approaching hangry status and while I’m sure we could have found more authentic, more off the beaten path types of restaurants in a less traffic’ed area, there was still so much we wanted to do. We found a row of restaurants and told Stephanie she could choose whichever looked the best to her, which is how we ended up at Fiorino d’Oro, where we feasted on cappuccino, burrata, bruschetta, pastas and pizza. An Italian feast of bright colors and subtle flavors.

 

 

 

 

 

[Nicole721]

With the photo stops and lunch under our belts, we focused on our top priority for the day: shopping. Of all of the Italy ports we’d visited before, we knew Florence would be the best one for shopping, with deals on leather goods and textiles. I gave Mom permission to cut up my credit card if I tried to buy anything at Gucci or Louis Vuitton because I still haven’t unboxed the handbags I’ve bought on two of our previous three Europe trips (they just look so pretty in the boxes!). But I did want a new spring handbag and a leather backpack if I could find one. We made our way into at least half a dozen stores. I was disappointed that the merchandise we were finding wasn’t entirely different from what we found two years prior. I did find a new spring handbag. I couldn’t find a deal I couldn’t turn down on a backpack, but I still had plenty of ports ahead of me.

 

 

 

Somehow, we were approaching our meet up time and I didn’t know where the day went. One minute, we were getting dressed and riding on a bus, the next I was telling Mom to take in the fact that she was sitting in Florence eating pizza and the next, the day was drawing to a close. We started making our way back to Piazza del Santa Croce so we’d be near our meeting point and we just kind of meandered around, taking pictures, stopping in some more stores and enjoying some gelato (because it’s always gelato weather in Italy, even when it’s cold and rainy).

 

 

 

 

[Nicole721]

Our group met outside a large store that must have been affiliated with the ship or tour company because they offered free public restrooms and sold merchandise at a marked up price that they then gave several “discounts” on. The rain really started coming down as we walked back to the bus, and I swear the walk felt like it would never stop. By the end of it, I didn’t know where the hours in the day went and I didn’t feel like we accomplished a ton, but we’d walked over seven miles and between the walking, the cold and the rain, I wanted back on that bus. Otherwise, I’d just dwell in how much more I wanted to see instead of reveling in everything I had experienced. I’ll always want more of Florence, more time, more pictures, more of that delish spaghetti carbonara, because something about everything there inspires the kind of awe that I have trouble conjuring at home. I’ll stare at the Sears Tower or at the Museum Campus on my walk home from work every day and I feel like I don’t even see them sometimes. They’re just there. I go to Florence for a few hours and everything is live action poetry that I’ll wax on about until my next visit.

 

The drive back from Florence should have only taken an hour and a half, two hours max, but a terrible accident that killed four people shut down the highway. Thanks to the diligence of our driver and guide, they pulled us out of the traffic and onto an alternative route. It added an extra hour to our drive, but that was a drop in the bucket: the ship left 15 people in Florence who were on private tours and got stuck in traffic. And, listen, I’m not going to turn this into a private tour vs ships tour thing: we’ve done it both ways and there are certainly merits and drawbacks to both. No one should decide where they book their excursion from because the possibility exists that a car accident is going to kill a number of people and shut down the highway. It’s such a fringe possibility. That said, this was a reminder that these things do happen, and that if we do book privately and remove the safety net of having the ship wait for us, we should reconsider what a safe buffer looks like.

 

 

We were one of the last busses to pull up to Livorno, and I was so happy to see that the Horizon didn’t just open one gangway or two gangways, but three: one forward, one middle, one aft. Not only did this help ease crowding immensely, but it allowed us to choose the gangway closest to our room and board there. The walk back to the cabin from the gangway always feels like it takes forever, and having a gangway one deck below your room? That’s super convenient when you’ve had a long day.

 

[Nicole721]

We were absolutely famished by the time we got back to the room, so we were elated to see that our room had already been turned down for the evening. We dropped our bags on our beds, freshened up and headed up to deck five to check in for dinner. On the Horizon, instead of going to the dining room to get a table, if you have Your Time Dining, you’ll check in with a hostess in a booth off Ocean Plaza. I’ve heard that if you’re Platinum or Diamond, you can circumvent this and go directly to the dining room, but we’ve just always stopped on our way. There was no line to check in and we were assigned a private table in seconds before being directed downstairs to the dining room, where there was a line from the host stand all the way back to the staircase. The only downside to sailing on an inaugural cruise is that there are a ton of kinks that need to get worked out and those only settle with time. Our dining staff for the evening was efficient and friendly (and got our order 100% correct – a feat with how this family orders sometimes!), and the dining manager made the rounds to each table, personally apologizing for the missteps the first two nights. Since we’d dined at the specialty restaurants, we had no idea what he was referring to, but apparently, there were some pacing issues, as well as some food quality issues, by what we gathered from the ladies sitting at the table next to us. Thankfully, we faced no issues and and a really great first meal in the main dining room.

 

Bread Basket

 

Cannelloni

 

Shrimp Cocktail

 

Tuscan Minestrone

 

Roasted Broccoli & 3 Cheese

 

Red Beet Carpaccio

 

Caesar Salad

[Nicole721]

BBQ Pork Spareribs

 

Grilled Beef Tenderloin

 

Bitter n Blanc

 

Carnival Melting Chocolate Cake

 

S’mores Parfait

 

[Nicole721]

The ship left slightly behind schedule, as we were finishing our desserts and coffee. With no Playlist Show, deck party or any big organized activity, we headed out to the atrium to watch the Thriller Dance Lesson (where CD Mike made his Mom join the group and dance along with him!) and browse through some of the shops.

 

 

 

We called it an early evening, and I hate to say it because this ship is so beautiful and has so much to offer, and we were done for the evening by 10:00 PM. We’d get to explore every part of the ship as we moved away from the early morning wakeups. We had a number of sea days (and easy port days) ahead of us, and plenty of time to continue our getting to know you with the Horizon.

[Nicole721]

Day 8: Civitavecchia (Rome), Italy

 

Legend has it that if you throw a coin with your right hand, over your left shoulder, into the Trevi fountain, it will ensure that you return to Rome. On our first trip to Rome in 2015, we made it a point to take a tour that would take us to the fountain.

 

We returned in 2016.

 

In 2016, we made it a point to go back to the fountain to throw another coin in.

 

We returned in 2018.

 

So while I’m not going to sit here and say the reason we returned to Rome was because we threw coins into the Trevi Fountain per se, I did win this trip off of an Instagram post and that never happens so I’m also not saying that the reason we returned to Rome wasn’t because we threw coins into the Trevi Fountain. So basically, I’m not saying, I’m just saying.

 

 

We were docked in Civitavecchia before I woke up, but it was another day of waking up earlier on vacation than I do at home to go to work. We grabbed another quick breakfast on an empty Ocean Plaza and headed over to the Liquid Lounge to grab our tour stickers, finding it to be much less frenetic and much more orderly than it had been the day before with the Florence tours.

 

 

For our day in Rome, we had booked a Rome On Your Own tour through the ship, which was, for all intents and purposes, another hosted transfer from the dock in Civitavecchia to Rome’s city center, where we’d have seven hours to do whatever we wanted. Our guide for the transfer was a lovely Italian woman named Corina, who was helpful in doling out suggestions and tips over the hour and a half drive.

 

 

On our first trip to Rome, we did a super intensive tour that took us to the Trevi Fountain, inside the Colosseum, to a lunch inside a swanky hotel and a full half day tour of the Vatican museum and Sistine Chapel. It’s probably one of the most exhaustive tours I’ve ever done. But in that, we’ve kind of not only seen the “big” attractions, but we’ve toured them exhaustively. So while Corina was offering to help organize tours, tickets to the Colosseum or the Vatican, we knew our day was going to involve sitting on the top of a Hop On Hop Off bus, enjoying the hustle and bustle of the city and walking around our favorite parts (and, you know, throwing another coin into the Trevi Fountain just to be safe).

[Nicole721]

Corina had offered to help facilitate tickets onto the Green Line Hop On Hop Off bus, but we declined for two reasons: one, the Green Line had poor reviews and two, many people on our bus were going to take her up on it, and it was pretty clear the company she worked for was affiliated with the Green Line, which meant all other Rome On Your Own tours were also likely to funnel passengers onto the Green Line. So when the bus dropped us off near the Colosseum, instead of following the line with Corina to get tickets to the Green Line, we found the CitySightseeing Roma agent and bought tickets to their bus for €23 a piece.

 

 

 

While we were walking past the Colosseum, a local man tried to harass us into talking to him so he could sell us on whatever he was selling. He was super aggressive and persistent and while it’s not human nature to ignore someone talking directly at you, I’ve found that a polite but firm no thank you while continuing to walk away and avoiding eye contact is really the best way to get them to leave you alone.

[Nicole721]

We hopped on the first bus we could, quickly finding seats on the upper deck and beginning our ride through Rome. We drove past the Circus Maximus, the Arco di Constantino and the Teatro Marcello and I just kind of sat there and marveled at how uniquely awesome Rome is. Rome is a fully modern city. In many regards, it reminds me of New York, but with one big difference: this modern city is built around the remnants and ruins of a huge, historically significant ancient civilization, the lore of which was the subject of an entire summer of World History courses when I was in high school. We’d glide past Circus Maximus and the Colosseum and all I’d picture is the gladiators, the fights and the way of life, and how amazing it is that the remnants of that era are not stowed away in a museum, but still in their original place where anyone can visit them and where they serve as a persistent reminder of the history of the city.

 

 

 

 

 

[Nicole721]

Our first stop off the bus was the Trevi Fountain. We hopped out near the Piazza di Spagna, which is a short walk away. Many of the main sites are located within the center of the city, off streets too narrow for these busses to navigate, so they stop on larger streets a short walk away. It started to rain a bit as we were walking towards the Via del Tritone, and we waited it out in a really charming courtyard. The rain was unfortunate but short-lived. If the worst we got in April travels were a couple of short rain showers, I’d consider our trip lucky.

 

 

 

The walk to the Trevi Fountain is one of my favorites. There are so many shops and cafés, which you’d expect near a big tourist attraction, but the prices at the shops are some of the best we found in Italy, and the restaurants and cafés weren’t tourist traps – they were authentic Italian eateries. But my favorite part is how, when you’re maybe a block away, you just know you’re going the right way because you start to hear the soft hissing of the water flowing through the monument and the buzzing of excitement from the crowds of people trying to get their pictures taken.

 

 

 

The first time we visited, the Trevi Fountain was undergoing massive renovations and was covered in scaffolding. The second time, we could go right up to the edge of the pool. This time, we could only get as far as a pedestrian railing overlooking the entire fountain. And it was packed tight. We wouldn’t get to snap that perfect Boomerang throwing a coin in, but we got a good enough vantage spot to snap some pics and throw our coins in. Hopefully it brings us back to Rome in the next year or two.

 

[Nicole721]

Afterwards, we headed to a nearby outdoor café for some cappuccinos. Someone once told us that locals will never order any espresso drinks containing milk after 11:00 AM and that’s how you mark yourself as a tourist. I’d have a pretty hard time passing for a local in Rome as is because my broken attempt at speaking Italian is terrible (and my vocabulary is limited to shouting Andiamo! to my family), but I got my cappuccino in before that self-imposed cut off just to be safe.

 

 

 

 

The shopping we’d found in Florence the day prior had been disappointing, to put it mildly. The prices weren’t as low and the selection wasn’t as high as we’d found it on our previous two visits. In Rome, though, we found amazing deals on higher quality leather, scarves and Murano glass and we spent at least an hour trying on bags and scarves and convincing ourselves we didn’t need any more (an effort in vain – I bought a leather backpack and another leather handbag and Mom bought at least six scarves).

 

[Nicole721]

We were going to grab lunch, but lunch in Italy falls a little later than it does back at home, and a bus had just pulled up to the stop, so we hopped on and scored some primo seats, opting to ride a loop around and enjoy the sights of the city.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Nicole721]

 

 

 

 

 

[Nicole721]

A full loop around on the Hop On Hop Off bus takes 1:45 – two hours. It passes by quickly – so much so that as we were finishing our loop, we realized we were two hours away from our 5:00 PM meeting time. And that sounds like a lot of time, right? Except we wanted to get back early so we didn’t chance being those people that hold up an entire bus of tired, cranky tourists and we wanted to have a nice Italian lunch, which can often times be a time consuming proposition. The bus takes a short 15-minute break as they change staff, somewhere around the train station. We hopped out there, found a nearby restaurant that had an expansive menu and ordered a few items to share. My mushroom risotto tasted great, but wasn’t as thick or creamy as traditional risottos are, but Mom’s gnocchi and Stephanie’s penne arribbiata were super tasty, and we got to wait out another short rain shower from a covered patio with a carb feast in Italy. It doesn’t get much better than that.

 

 

Stephanie really wanted gelato before we left, but, go figure, we couldn’t find a gelato shop anywhere nearby, and we were close enough to the meeting point that we’d be too early if we headed back when we finished lunch, so we mapped ourselves to Pasticceria Panificio, a nearby bakery that had good reviews on TripAdvisor. The bakery smelled like a sugary heaven, with dozens of different Italian cookies. We each created our own bag of treats and brought them back onto the bus with us to enjoy on the ride home.

 

 

The bus dropped us off right at our meeting point for our tour group, where we met back with Corina and the rest of our group. Two people were missing, and Corina received a call that they were stuck in line at St. Peter’s Basilica and she worked out another bus group they could ride back with so they didn’t get left and our group wouldn’t be delayed. This was fortuitous for both sides, as there was another accident that backed up traffic going back to Civitavecchia, adding nearly an hour to our drive back. I slept through it (…again), but Stephanie tells me the wreckage was horrific.

[Nicole721]

We were back onboard around 7:30 PM and found our room had once again been turned down before we got back, which was awesome. Not so awesome were two things: one, for the second day in a row, we found dirty towels hung up on the racks and this ship was far too new for that. Secondly, our room was absurdly hot, especially in the evenings. We weren’t sure if the temps were up because it was cooler out with lower spring-like temperatures outside or if it was a cooling system issue, but our steward assured us he’d have someone take a look at it and our room was much cooler later that evening.

 

The only big drawback to sailing on an inaugural voyage is that many operational kinks need to be worked out with customers, which is a great learning experience in the long run for the crew, but kind of awful to have to go through. On this cruise, it was the main dining room. We’d find no lines to check in for a dining time on Deck 5, only to get downstairs and have to wait in a line for 20 minutes to even reach the host stand to get seated. The servers were frazzled from managing so many tables at once and the meal was paced poorly. I had two appetizers come out at once on this evening, while Mom and Stephanie sat and waited for theirs. All of our main entrees came two to three degrees undercooked and our desserts were delicious, but warm options served cold. The servers were extraordinarily apologetic and we were completely sympathetic of the fact that they’re on new ships with new teams, but after a long day in port, it would have been nice to have a peaceful meal.