Suggestions for Oceania Med Cruise

[centsable]

My husband & I are going on the Mediterrean Cruise with Oceania Oct 20, 2008 Rome to Athens. Anyone been on that cruise? Suggestions for pre & post hotels, port excursions. Anything MUSTS to see any things to avoid?This is our 1st Mediterrean cruise.

[Andee]

I've been on two Oceania Med cruises--Venice to Athens and Barcelona to Lisbon. Some of the ports may be the same, but I'm admittedly too lazy to look up your ports--if you list them, it will be easier to help you.

 

In Athens, we hired Spiros fom wwwdotAthensTaxidotnet to pick us up at the ship, take us on a tour of Athens, and drop us at the hotel. He was a wealth of inofrmation, and we enjoyed the tour very much. Because he isn't a licensed guide, he couldn't take us around the Acropolis, but he talked about it before we got there, and lent us a wonderful guidebook.

 

We stayed at the Athens Cypria Hotel, which we liked. It was clean, convenient, with large rooms, modern bathrooms, moderate pices, and a friendly, helpful front desk staff. Ask for a room on the 6th floor with a view of the Parthenon.

[china addict]

DH and I sailed the Med with O in 2006 and 2007 and loved it. Best advice is to arrive a couple of days early to recover from jet lag, make sure you have your luggage, etc. There are horror stories about people who time it too close and miss the boat. However, O's land packages are notoriously expensive so unless money is no object I would book hotels/transfers myself. If starting in Rome I would book the Hotel Mozart via Internet. We stayed there in May and loved it, right on Via del Corso, walking distance to Spanish Steps, Trevi Fountain, etc, with huge bathrooms and good breakfast. Also rooftop terrace great for drinking in the sights and listening to church bells. Cabs are plentiful at FCO (Rome's international airport) but if you research well you can reserve your own car for just a few Euros more. Same limo company should give better rate than Oceania for transfer to Civitavecchia where boat leaves. If you haven't seen the countryside before, spend a little more and have limo driver take the scenic route. Also, go to the roll call for your cruise and team up with fellow passengers to share limos and save even more. We don't have the same comfort level in Athens that we do in Rome, so in Athens we pay for O's transfer to the airport. Enjoy!

[meow!]

We don't have the same comfort level in Athens that we do in Rome, so in Athens we pay for O's transfer to the airport.

Please explain what you mean, difficult to get taxis, find English speaking people, not so safe or problems from the recent fire? It is still very early, but we are booked for next October's Nautica Venice to Athens, and plan to stay three days on our own in Athens. We are the dependent on taxis all the way type, any problems? Thank you.

[Zimmy]

Meow, I don't think you need worry about being safe in Athens. While one must take precautions in any big city, we felt very comfortable and safe in Athens. Taxis were plentiful, and we found that most locals we encountered spoke English.

[china addict]

Yes, taxis are plentiful in Athens, but we found the drivers very pushy and got ripped off by one who took us to his "sister's" gift shop in Plaka and "brother's" restaurant where we were billed an outrageous amount for a simple lunch. We never felt in any personal danger but didn't get what we bargained for. Also, not knowing a word of the language and being unable to read Greek, we were easy prey. We thought the picture menu for lunch would simplify things but it didn't work out that way. In Spain, France and Italy, we understand the basics and don't seem to run into problems. We thought Athens was dirty, overcrowded and not to our liking. Before people start flaming me, please remember that in my initial post I merely said "we don't have the same comfort level in Athens that we do in Rome". We wanted the reliability of Oceania's transfer to Athens Airport for our return flight, even if it cost a little more. Life is short and we prefer to spend our time and money where we feel most welcome and in our comfort zone. We are not timid travellers and usually explore on our own or arrange private guides, but Athens is not high on our list for a return visit.

[china addict]

It seems I'm not the only one who is less than thrilled with taxi drivers in Athens. See this thread which was just referenced by someone else, specifically with regard to Athens: http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=377567

I know it can happen anywhere, but I still think the OP should be watchful.

[meow!]

Thank you kindly for the link. Keeping in mind what you have said about Athens and the fact that we have difficulty walking any distance, I guess we should stay in a hotel right where shops and restaurants are. Do you have any recommedation of such a hotel which is not too expensive, e.g. under 200 euros per day, which is clean, air conditioned and with elevators?

[pschmitt22]

It seems I'm not the only one who is less than thrilled with taxi drivers in Athens.

 

In mid September 2007 we took a taxi from the port to Intercontinental Athens. Three couples from the cruise arrived in different taxis at just about the same time. All paid different fares...15E 20E and 23E. We paid the 20E--had asked the taxi driver what the cost would be and he said 20E...although the meter read 11.50 when we arrived.

 

From the hotel to the airport, we had a taxi driver that we could not communicate with as he spoke no English, he had Greek talk radio blasting in our ears on the entire trip, drove like he was on the slow boat to China,--it was 3 am and all vehicles were whizzing by his car, he was sucking on hard candies--discarding the wrappers out the window. He was just running up the fare.

 

I am not complaining that he did not speak English(after all we were in a foreign country) but we were frustrated at his shortfalls--we would have liked to politely asked him to turn down the volume on the radio, turn it off or on to music, speed up, etc.

 

We travel internationally a lot and this is the only time we have had an unpleasant transfer.

[dbh62ark]

My husband & I are going on the Mediterrean Cruise with Oceania Oct 20, 2008 Rome to Athens. Anyone been on that cruise? Suggestions for pre & post hotels, port excursions. Anything MUSTS to see any things to avoid?This is our 1st Mediterrean cruise.

Welcome to CruiseCritic. You'll find great information on the Europe boards at http://boards.cruisecritic.com/forumdisplay.php?f=234 for each of your ports. There is a search feature on the right side at the top of the page, and if you put in each of your ports, you'll find a lot of helpful tips. I'm not sure which ports you are visiting (we cruised the Insignia from Dover to Barcelona last year on an unusual Med itinerary), but I echo all the statements made about Athens. We also used athenstaxi . net in June this year (we also cruised the Med this year but on another cruise line) and highly recommend.

 

Have a great trip,

Donna

[taloolabelle]

:D What a wonderful trip! I cruised Galaxy in Med last year with my mom and sister...This year talked my husband into celebrating our 30 years tog with good friends on Insignia. We splurged and each got an OS. Weather was great. Venice and all ports were terrific. Even Albania. Insignia stopped in Albania for first time ever. It was our only cool day...and although Albania has little to offer the seasoned cruiser (which we are not) it reamains facinating to see a country emerging out of 50 years of communism. The people were kind even when our bus was hit by a local taxi...all the more drama...things were well handled! We were in Turkey and Ephesus on September 11...very memorable.I will try to post suite photos but OS are just the best. If you want any more info, let me know and i can send you a link to photos. We have booked for next year...it was that great.:)

In Venice suggest Westin Europe and Regina (on grand canal). we stayed there 5 days and 4 in Athens.. and Athens Grande Bretagne (excellent Oceania staffed desk when we were there..made reservations for dinner, etc) The Food, service, fellow travelers....great. My husband was unsure about a cruise...but quickly realized the quality and excellence of Oceania.