Long Review of Brilliance of the Seas - Med/Greek Isles, July 22 - August 3, 2006

[jstducky]

Cindy:

 

It was just for the time and his knowledge. The entrance fee for the Vatican Museum was 12 Euros per person. Lucca made the joke that on average 20,000 people a day visit the Vatican Museum, multiply that by 12 Euros, no wonder the Vatican is the wealthiest country in the world!

[terrybiz]

Your review was wonderful, we are sailing her in September, can you tell me where the BRILLANCE is dock, is that the port closest to las Ramblas.

[kleg59]

It was the Hotel Continental Barcelona. I beleive the Palacete is a few blocks off of Las Ramblas.

Thank you for the info!

Loved your photos!

Kim

[TheMiz]

It seems that lost baggage is quite a problem for Barcelona arrivals, regardless of airline.

 

We were on the June 4th sailing of BOS and our bags were lost by Air France and our friends bags were lost by Continental. Luckily they arrived before sailaway. There were many others picking up bags at the various ports throughout the cruise.

 

Which brings us to the age old question

Do you put your tags on your bags before you leave the states?

[TheMiz]

Cindy:

 

It was just for the time and his knowledge. The entrance fee for the Vatican Museum was 12 Euros per person. Lucca made the joke that on average 20,000 people a day visit the Vatican Museum, multiply that by 12 Euros, no wonder the Vatican is the wealthiest country in the world!

 

How long was the line to get your Museum tickets?

[TheMiz]

jstducky

 

What time did you board the ship?

 

I am wondering if we can board as early as 1pm

[Maggie Mae]

I was on the same cruise as Ducky and I was on the ship around 12:00. They really do this well - we left our hotel around 11:30 and we were having lunch just past noon.

You will have a great trip.

[jstducky]

Your review was wonderful, we are sailing her in September, can you tell me where the BRILLANCE is dock, is that the port closest to las Ramblas.

 

Let's see, the cruise ship docks at the pier called Moll D'Adossat. If you tell this to your taxi driver, he will know where to take you. The pier isn't that far from the Christopher Columbus statue which is the very southern end of Las Ramblas.

 

I saw people walking dragging their luggage along, but I really wouldn't recommend it as to get to the pier you have to walk over a long bridge, make a right and then down and around this really long ramp. Distance wise, we're talking about 1.5 miles from the Christopher Columbus statue.

[jstducky]

Which brings us to the age old question

Do you put your tags on your bags before you leave the states?

 

If you are referring to the ship tags, then no. I didn't put them on when I left the states. I felt like I didn't want to confuse the baggage handlers even more by putting on extra tags that meant nothing to them. My plan was to get my bags in Barcelona and put the ship tags on then. Of course, it didn't work out that way. However, my bags reached me at the ship just fine and since the bags had our personal baggage tags on them with our names, the ship personnel figured out which cabin we were and sent our luggage to us.

[jstducky]

How long was the line to get your Museum tickets?

 

The line wound all the way around the outside wall of the Vatican. Probably at least a mile long. My guess is that it would have been a little over an hour wait.

 

However, our tour guide had a special "technique" for us to get to the front of the line and we were in within 5 minutes. He said to us, "when in Rome, do like the Romans..."

[TheMiz]

The line wound all the way around the outside wall of the Vatican. Probably at least a mile long. My guess is that it would have been a little over an hour wait.

 

However, our tour guide had a special "technique" for us to get to the front of the line and we were in within 5 minutes. He said to us, "when in Rome, do like the Romans..."

 

We are set up to do the Vatican in the afternoon , we are using the services of Claudio Caponera

He told me there was no need to pre buy tickets

[jstducky]

We are set up to do the Vatican in the afternoon , we are using the services of Claudio Caponera

He told me there was no need to pre buy tickets

 

generally after lunch the lines for the Vatican Museum are alot smaller. When we got to the Vatican at 11:00 am the line wrapped all the way around the building. By the time we came back to the front entrance at 1:00 pm, the line was so short it couldn't have been more than a few minutes.

[scootero]

Thanks jstducky for the wonderful detailed review and pictures. We are on the 14 Night Greek Isle/Venice cruise Oct 24th out of Istanbul. Your review of each stop and of the ship adds to our growing list of notes as to what to expect and how to get around. Although we have had over a year for planning, one can never have enough info on what to do and see. It's amazing with all that is going on in this world people take the time to help and advise others through these boards so they too can enjoy themselves and make it easier when traveling to other parts of the world.

Again thanks for the great review and pictures.

 

Happy sailing to all :):):)

 

Scott & Joni O.

[Momof3kids]

First, let me say what a great review. We are sailing BOS in June of 07, and your review was very helpful and enjoyable. Do you remember if they have hairdryers available at this hotel? We will be there for one night before the cruise and we where curious if we needed to go to the trouble of trying to get one that worked in Spain, or if they had one available. Thanks. It is a small question, but one we girls want to know about.

[jstducky]

Yes, there was a small hairdryer in our bathroom. I'm going to assume there is in every bathroom. So I think you are ok there.

[Momof3kids]

Thank-you for the blowdryer info. As I said before, you review was great!!!

[jstducky]

thanks!

 

good luck in planning your trip.

[jstducky]

if anyone is interested in seeing more pictures... here's a link to my pictures from the trip...

 

http://community.webshots.com/user/jstduckyluvsucla

[katz]

I have loved reading your review!! We are sailing on BOS on October 2.

 

We have also hired one of the people from Greek Taxi as our guide in Athens. We have Nickolas.

 

I am wondering how your tour went. Were you happy with their services. So far, they have been very easy to deal with over the internet.

 

Any thoughts that you have about your tour would be appreciated.

[Dorothy]

Thank you for writing your review. We did Italy a couple months ago, so it was nice to read your experiences and relive our memories. Next year, we are doing Greece, so I read with great interest about each port. Such a shame to miss Mykonos. Can you post the contact info on your driver in Athens? He sounds great. I think I'd like to book him.

 

I'm sorry to hear about your rocky start, but glad to hear it was fixed within a couple days. As a suggestion to others, share space in each others suit cases, so if one gets lost, then you all still have a couple changes of clothes. Also, I know others are die hard ATM'ers, but I didn't want to take any chances and purchased Euro traveler checks and a few hundred Euro's before leaving the states. Better to pay a small fee and not take the chance of a hassle if the cards don't work.

[Maggie Mae]

When preparing for the 7/22nd cruise I was told that the Europeans were not thrilled with the Euro travelers checks and they were not widely accepted so I did not purchase any. I only spoke with one person that had them and he confirmed they were not accepted at many places. We purchased Euros here and that worked for us. I thought I would have to use the ATM to get more but I did not. I have used the ATM in the past in Europe with no problem.

[jstducky]

I have loved reading your review!! We are sailing on BOS on October 2.

 

We have also hired one of the people from Greek Taxi as our guide in Athens. We have Nickolas.

 

I am wondering how your tour went. Were you happy with their services. So far, they have been very easy to deal with over the internet.

 

Any thoughts that you have about your tour would be appreciated.

 

Dorothy - the contact info for Greek Taxi was admin@*****. I beleive his website is http://www.*****. The owner of the company was Paul. He works with his 2 sons Nick and Jimmy and a few other drivers. I had Paul as my guide and I've heard that Nick is excellent too. If you decide to go with him, request via email to get either Nick or Paul. If they aren't already booked for that day, he will honor your request.

 

Katz - I loved Paul. Nick is his son and I've heard nothing but great reviews about Nick. Paul lived in NY/NJ for 25 years and ran a pizza business. Nick was born in the States. They both have excellent English.

 

For my family, we all agreed that Paul was the best tour guide, both private and through the ship, we had on our 12 day cruise. Paul was fantastic. He knew all of the good spots to take us, gave us great recommendations, was really flexible about what we wanted to see and do, and was very knowledgable. He was so kind and generous and I wouldn't hesitate to contact him or his company to anybody going to Athens.

[jstducky]

I agree, its important to take some Euros with you. If nothing else, you have peace of mind that you'll be ok for a few days if you run into ATM problems, etc.

 

Luckily for us, we bought about 200 Euros before we left on our trip. We decided not to do the Euro traveler's checks since we heard that it was hard to use. But we did bring US cash with us, in the event we might need it. So therefore, even though we were having ATM issues when we arrived in Barcelona, we were ok because we had some Euros and we had US Cash that we could exchange if we really couldn't get our ATM situation worked out.

[tomsaint11]

Much time has passed since your review, but it is a great overview for people taking the identical trip.