I am a planner, as I have said (and as you should know by now). When I decided I wanted to take a cruise, I didn't take any decisions lightly. Everything I picked or planned had a lot of research and planning that went into it. Starting with which cruise we were going to take. I had looked into a lot of different itineraries for different cruise lines. Originally I wasn't sure of what ports I wanted to visit - which turned into researching what was at different ports and doing some Google image searches. I know that sounds silly, but I am a visual person, and if I "see" what a place looks like my desire to go there can be swayed. In all honesty, when I started searching for cruises I thought I was going to take a more "traditional" Mediterranean cruise, which is usually a week long cruise which has stops in Rome, Barcelona, and then a shifting number of stops in France and Italy. But, a lot of the stops in Italy were places we've already visited. Which is why I looked to Greek cruises. Josh is a big fan of Greek mythology and Greek antiquities, so it seemed a good place to go. Looking into the ports, I knew I wanted to see Santorini, Mykonos, Athens, and Olympia. For the timing of the cruise I wanted one which wasn't in peak season (end of Sept until April-ish) for a cheaper price and for less people (since kids are back in school) - this timing also worked out better for both of us with work. After looking into different cruise lines and asking people who have cruised before, I decided I wanted to go with a US-based cruise line. My reasoning for this (which may sound silly) was because I wanted the shows to be in English. I'm a huge drama/Broadway/theater nerd/junkie, and I was excited about seeing shows, any shows, even if they were crappy or lame. I wanted to be able to enjoy them. Again, this sounds silly, but I deal with a language barrier on a daily basis. When going on vacation, I wanted the opportunity to NOT have to think/struggle to communicate. I realize that on pretty much all cruise lines (especially those with European sailings) things are multilingual. But, I didn't want to have to worry about language at all, period. I should add a note here that I have read multiple blogs of people who have sailed on non-US cruise lines (such as MSC or Costa, which are Italian) and have had a great time with not problems at all with language. But, I still wanted to stick with a US company, which left our cruising options (for the time/area I wanted) to Royal Caribbean or Norwegian. So in the end I selected our cruise on Royal Caribbean because of the ports and the timing of the cruise.
Our ship was Legend of the Seas, which is an older ship (which has been refurbished. I thought the interior looked fabulous), so it is on the smaller side when compared to other ships (especially those which go in the Caribbean or Bahamas). A lot of other passengers made comments about it being a smaller ship and not having as many amenities as other ships. Personally, I was happy with things the way they were. The fact that there was only two pools instead of seven wasn't going to ruin my vacation. As it was, I was impressed by everything which was on-board. Cruise ships really are like a floating city.
Now in true Kirsten form, I really prepared for our cruise. I looked at the Royal Caribbean website. I asked friends who had cruised. I read countless blogs and websites to get tips on what to do/not to do. This helped me to feel prepared and helped me to figure out what to pack. I knew for our cruise we would have two formal nights, and a few "smart casual" nights (which Royal Caribbean defines as skirts/dress pants for ladies, dress pants but not a suit for men. However... Josh wore nice dark denim jeans for two of the smart casual nights and no one said a word). I also looked into the weather (which it was hard to figure the weather for a port 10 days ahead of time) and there was a wide range of temperatures and the possibility of rain. I wanted to have enough clothes, but I didn't want to over-pack as so many people talked about how small cruise ship rooms are and how there is no space. For anyone who is looking to cruise - I wore on the ship a pair of jeans and a light fleece jacket. I packed one pair of jeans, three skirts, two sun dresses, four cocktail dresses, two t-shirts, five tank tops, one lighter "cute" jacket, two sweaters, a swimsuit, a swim suit cover-up, one work-out outfit, one pair athletic shoes, two pairs of gladiator sandals, one comfy pair of flats, one pair of Toms flats, and one pair of dressy flats. Yes, a lot of shoes. And. I would not have changed a single thing about how I packed. It was the perfect amount. I had a variety of of things I could wear to any of the dinners. I had purposely packed in a way where I could mix-match and re-wear things. With my variety of shoes I felt I could make more outfits, and if one day a pair of shoes started to rub my feet the wrong way I could just switch out for another pair. Also - just a note for anyone traveling in Europe - pack skirts instead of shorts. Shorts will mark you as an American tourist in two seconds flat. I have recently discovered that skirts are an extremely comfortable alternative to shorts, and it makes you appear a bit more put together. Just sayin'. Anyways. I felt I didn't over-pack. I did pack a gallon Ziplock full of any possible medication we could have needed - anything from Tums to Immodium, ibuprofen, allergy meds, cold meds. Thank goodness we didn't need any of them, but I'm glad I had them with me. Two suggestions I read online which I did forget to pack and I wish I had - card games and a weight/clip for the shower curtain. I fully intended to pack Uno and a deck of cards for our trip, but forgot (more on this later). I had also read suggestions of bringing a clip to put on the bottom of the shower curtain to weight it down/help keep it in place. I thought this was a good idea, but forgot to bring it. I personally didn't have any problems, but with the tiny shower Josh had issues with the shower curtain sticking to his butt/belly. Enough said.
My original plan had been to pack the weekend before we left (we flew out on a Thursday). However, our guest was visiting (which I didn't know was going to happen until two weeks before). Not a big deal, I just ended up doing my packing on Wednesday, the day before. Had I been smart, I would have started packing Tuesday night. I think I just needed an extra bit of time to lay everything out and check/re-check my list. It may have also helped if I had made a packing list at least a week prior so I could remember to add items to the list (such as card games). As it was, I packed on Wednesday and left Josh's items laying out for him to "examine" (I didn't want to pack for him necessarily, but I wanted to "suggest" things for him to wear on the trip, like polo shirts versus t-shirts). Our flight didn't leave Thursday until the afternoon, so in the morning I met a friend for coffee, leaving Josh to pack. When I got home from coffee he wasn't completely packed - sigh. After getting the rest of our items together, I started to get really paranoid about our packing. We were flying on Ryanair, and they are very strict about luggage. I had paid for the heaviest possible checked bag, but if your bag is heavy when you check-in it is a hefty fee. They are also very strict about the size/weight of carry-on luggage. At first Josh and I were going to share the checked bag, I was going to have a small roller carry-on bag, and Josh was going to use his large backpack as a carry on. But... about an hour before we were going to leave the house I was panicking about our luggage being heavy/too much... So I went online and ended up paying to for a second checked bag. A bit more expensive, but it gave me peace of mind, and in the end I'm glad we had extra space. However, when I was looking for airfare I was debating Ryanair versus flying on Lufthansa out of Frankfurt airport. Ryanair is usually a low-cost airline, but because of the timing (flying to Venice right before a long weekend, Columbus Day) the flight was more expensive than usual. We could have flown on Lufthansa out of Frankfurt for a bit more money, but the drive to the Frankfurt airport is longer, parking is more expensive... but we would have each gotten a free checked bag. I picked Ryanair. It worked out fine, but if I had it to do over again I think I would have gone with Lufthansa. Flying on Ryanair just makes me feel like I'm a cow being herded with a group of other panicked, stupid cows. Moo.
After my packing panic, we made it to the airport and on our flight with plenty of time to spare. Our flight to Venice was a bit rough - to the point where Josh was laughing at me as I gripped his hand in fright. But. We made it in one piece. We took a bus from the airport into Venice (about an hour ride). I had booked our hotel based on it's location - it was near the plaza where the bus was going to drop us off, and it was also close to the cruise terminal. I had used Google maps to get directions, but of course they weren't very helpful, and we ended up asking for directions multiple times. We walked around for a good twenty minutes before we finally found our hotel (which had been right in front of us the whole time). I had also chosen our hotel based on the price - it was at least 100 Euros cheaper than other hotels in the area. As soon as we got checked in to the hotel, I could see why it was cheaper. The hotel was clean, which in the end is all that matters, but it appeared to be an old prison/hospital/asylum which had been converted into a hotel. There were bars over all of the windows, and it is hard to describe, but you could tell by the layout of the hotel that it had once been something other than a hotel. This was slightly creepy... but we were only using the hotel as a stop-over. We found dinner - amazing Italian pizza and house wine, how I have missed you - and then settled in for the night.
The next morning we were up and ready to go early. We check out of our hotel and decided to make our way to the cruise terminal. We were very early - my cruise documents said our check-in could begin at 11 am. However, we didn't want to risk wandering around Venice, getting lost, and being late. So we found the cruise terminal and could see our ship - exciting!!! Josh wandered around (I think he was starting to get excited) while I sat on a bench and read. After an hour of waiting, I decided to see if we could start check-in early. They let us drop off our luggage, and then we went inside the terminal to check-in. Our check-in was complete and we were handed our SeaPass (ID card that also is a room key/ship charge card). We were on board the ship by 10:30 am. Our room wasn't going to be ready until 1, so we decided to explore the ship. This is probably because it was my first time on a cruise, but I was impressed with how beautiful the ship was. We saw the main public areas, looked over the shops and the casino, then looked at the adult only pool as well as the outdoor pool and track.
The indoor adult only pool. I spent a lot of time in these chairs with my Kindle.
The ship opened up the buffet at 11:30, so we went to have lunch. Anyone who has been on a cruise, or in all of the things I read everyone raved about the food. Nothing prepared me for the food. It is amazing. Period. There is such a wide variety of things! Healthy options, junk food, American food, ethnic food... all of it looks, smells, tastes amazing. Food EVERYWHERE. Nom nom. After one trip through the buffet (where I was a good girl and only had one plate full of mostly healthy choices) I could see how most people gain about ten pounds on a cruise. We still had some time to kill before our room was ready, so we went back outside. By the outdoor pool there was a large movie screen, and they had started to play The Great Gatsby. We lounged in deck chairs and watched the movie for about 45 minutes before we went to our room.
Our room - but I took this photo on our last day, so obviously it was much neater/crisper right after it had been cleaned.
I had done an equal amount of research when I picked our room. I picked an interior room, but I picked the largest interior room available. Neither Josh or I are claustrophobic, so we really didn't care if we had a window. We also weren't worried about the lack of sunlight/time of day issues (we set an alarm every night so we'd get up in the morning. Problem solved). I also went into this with the attitude that our room was just a place were we would store our stuff and sleep. Which was basically what it was. We didn't spent much time in our room, even on the days when we were "at sea." I was prepared for a tiny room (one of the reasons I had bought the largest interior room), but I thought our room was a good size. I think anyone who thinks a cruise ship room is small has obviously not spent time in a European hotel room. We had plenty of storage space and plenty of room to move around. I thought the size of our room was just fine. In fact, for our next cruise I want to compare the square footage of our room to that of some of the cheaper rooms. I would be willing to go down a bit in size really. I had also picked our room to be on an upper deck - I just didn't like the idea of being at the bottom of the ship. I figured it would be asking to get sea-sick. I was happy with our location - we only had to walk up one deck to get to the buffet, pools, and gym. I felt our room was quiet as well. So, good job Kirsten with room selection.
We saw our room, but our luggage wasn't there yet. My online research had suggested having your carry on bag with a change of clothes/swimming suit since it can take awhile for your bags to get there. We had packed some nicer "dinner" clothes, swimming suits, and other items needed to get ready with us, however we didn't need them. Dinner the first night was casual, so we never changed clothes. Venice was too cold and windy to get in the pool. But, I am glad we had things with us as an option. We spent the rest of the afternoon exploring. When it was time for the ship to leave we went out on the deck (along with most of the other passengers). There was a DJ who was playing music. Some people were dancing, some people were in the pool (I thought it was a little too cold for that), and some people were already on their way to having a good buzz.
Here I will interject my thoughts on beverages on the ship. On the ship you can have coffee, tea, water, iced tea, lemonade, and milk for free. In fact there were multiple beverage stations where you could grab something to drink as you were sitting by the pool or lounge area - hellllooooo coffee. I was a happy girl. Everything else had a charge. There were different beverage packages you could buy which, for a price, you could have unlimited beverages (of non-alcoholic and alcoholic nature). True to form... I researched the drink/wine/beer menu online and did some price comparison. Basically, for us to "break even" by purchasing a beverage package, we would each have to consume around 5-6 alcoholic drinks every day. It isn't that we couldn't have that much to drink, we easily could. But I just couldn't see myself coming in from a full day of sight-seeing and then drinking that much. I also didn't want to put myself in the frame of mind where I wanted to "get the most" out of my package, which I could have seen myself doing. I had read a blog post where a woman had done just that and woke up hungover for more than one port. Hmm. No thanks. I explained my reasoning to Josh, and basically told him if we drank enough to equal the cost (or what would have been the cost) of a beverage package, then we're the fools and we'd know for next time. I just couldn't justify paying $90 every day for unlimited beverages. I'm not that much of a lush, and I am cheap. As it was... we ordered a bottle of wine at dinner (averaging about $40 per bottle. Ouch) and a bottle would last us for two dinners. We had a total of four bottles of wine. Josh had a scotch during one show and a beer at another. I had one cocktail at a show and a Sprite during another. Personally... I was happy with that. There were times where I maybe could have gone for another cocktail or another glass of wine, but the reasons I chose not to were more because of calories rather than money concerns. So for us, no beverage package was the smart choice, I was happy with it. I think it would be different if we were on a cruise with more sea days where we were hanging out by the pool, or if we were in hotter weather, or if we were there with friends. All these things could lead to more beverages. But for me, I was happy with our decision.
Back to our Venice departure - Josh and I chose to just enjoy the scenery as the ship left Venice. It was actually a neat sight - the ship goes up through a channel past the heart of Venice. It made for some amazing photos.
Our dinner time was assigned for 6, which I was happy about - the other possible dinner time was 8:30, which is too late for my stomach. I was a bit nervous about the whole thing of being assigned a dinner time at a certain table with people. I wasn't sure how I would feel about it. Would this be awkward? What if we were assigned to sit with some awful people? Or would we be better off sticking to the buffet? We actually really enjoyed our dinner arrangement. We were seated at a table of ten, and the other eight people were all interesting couples from a variety of places. It was kind of nice at the end of each day to have dinner with familiar faces and ask how their day was, what they did, how they liked the port. We had some characters at our table, including Barbara and Rudy, a retired couple from Queens (with the full accent) who were in their late 70s. They were sweet, and just a hoot to talk to. Another couple was Alba and Henry from Texas, also retired, and Alba had a lot of Hispanic sass. It made each dinner entertaining. The food at dinner - wowza!! A full new menu each night with amazing things. So much good food. I tend to be a person who usually picks chicken and fish, but I ate a lot of beef - and it was all fantastic. I tended to stick to the routine of not having bread, only having one starter, one entree, and dessert (to attempt to NOT gain weight), but there were many people at our table who ordered multiple starters, multiple entrees, and multiple desserts. Rudy ordered two desserts and ice cream every night (my hero). Again, I could see how people gain weight - but ohhhhhh so delicious.
When we got back to our room after dinner our bags were there, so we unpacked and settled in for the night. Again, I thought our room had plenty of space, even with our luggage. I had been worried about sea-sickness. I've never been sea sick before and I've spent plenty of time out on the water in boats, but they've all been small boats. I wasn't sure how I would feel when the ship started moving. I think for the first few hours (especially at dinner) I just felt weird because I could feel the ship moving and I could we were moving when I looked outside. I never felt sick, just weird. But I adjusted to this quickly, and in fact I never got sick on our whole trip. When I laid down that night I only noticed the movement a bit, but quickly fell asleep. When we woke up the next morning, we were in our first port!
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