Age & Nationality?

[Athravan]

My husband and on our 2nd cruise on 25th August on the Calypso.

 

I have about a zillion questions most of which are being answered by reading reviews etc. but I have two that will probably best be answered by people who have been there.

 

Age - We are 25, our first cruise we took when we were 23 and most definitely one of the youngest couples aboard. As Calypso is an adults only, would you say it has a higher age average than most cruises? Will we still fit in okay? We have fairly conservative and I think laid back attitdues, and we are on the cruise for the historical and cultural ports, not to get drunk and party or things that may be attributed to those in their 20s on holiday, but my husband worries that people may not talk to us because we're so young, and we usually hope to find a few like minded people willing to go on tours or walk around museums or discuss things with us afterwards.

 

This was not really a problem on our last cruise but we did find that the people most interested in talking or socialising tended to be the younger families and a lot of people our age were daughters/sons of older couples also travelling as a family unit, and sometimes, we ended up being left with teenagers as company.

 

We also had some problems with disrespect from the staff, I did feel that we were treated more like children at times than adults, our cabin stewardess was very rude to us, yet extremely attentive to the elderly couple next door. Perhaps being in our mid 20s now and married will change that a little, and it is one of the main reasons we chose an adults only boat, so we would be treated like adults - perhaps our first cruise was just not the best experience!

 

Nationality - I know Thomson is a british cruise line, my husband is American who moved to the UK 5 years ago, does anyone think this will be a problem? On our last cruise some of the staff were quite rude about his nationality (there was a small problem with his passport needing to be kept in the reception safe for some reason as he was American, they said he was not allowed to keep his own passport, and we had to apply to withdraw his passport from the safe every time we wanted to leave ship, and they made it clear that it was a British cruise designed for british people and that we were an inconvenience - we were on the Island Escape)

 

We did phone Thomson before booking to verify that his nationality would not be a problem and that no extra visas or anything would be required.

[kruzseeka]

Goodness me - I was really surprised to hear of the way your husbnd was treated by the steward and staff on your previous cruise. That really is uncalled for and doesn't reflect well on the company concerned. I've never come across anything other than respectful/friendly/warm welcome from the staff on Thomson and i can't imagine anyone making anything of his nationality.

 

There are other nationalities on Thomson ships mainly a few Europeans (although one trip we did had about 400 Russians on board but that was exceptional - they even did the announcements in English & Russian!) but it's true to say it's predominantly UK passengers. I've always found everyone happy to talk. There has usually been at least one honeymoon couple on board and everyone makes a real fuss of them - young couples are in the minority but they've always seemed to be well integrated - especially at meal times when almost everyone seems to want to exchange experiences and relate tales of their various excursions. You're never short of something to talk about on a cruise! . If you are happy to chat, I'm sure you'll have no problems on Thomson ships.

 

Sorry can't help with the age profile of Calypso passengers - only been on the Celebration/Spirit/Destiny and found all of them really friendly and relaxed. But as we travel out of school holidays and have done an 'adults only' trip on Celebration we don't ususally see many children on board anyway. Perhaps recent Calypso passengers will help with this one.

 

I do hope you have a good experience on Thomson. Please let us know how you get on.:)

[kate52]

Hi- just returned from 2 weeks on the Calypso (for the second year running). There were 4 honeymoon couples on board in week 2, and generally a much younger age group than last year. We did hear some American accents around the ship, and met a very nice young couple from Lithuania! The majority of passengers were over 50, but there was a good mix of ages, and the "younger" ones didn't stand out.

On the first week they kept everyone's passports as we were in the Black Sea, but in week 2 we were only in Greece so they did not need them for customs. Hope this helps, have a great time,

kate

[jenny wren]

I would agree with all Kate has said...we were on for two weeks in June this year ...we had a party of about 50 greeks with us on the Black Sea....other than that a variety of ages at least one young honeymoon couple who loved it.. its not just the teenagers who drink too much !!! there were several older people who were making the most of their all inclusive drinks package!!!!!!!