Jill

Just grab a taxi at the port. Taxi stand has numerous taxis waiting. They are mostly open air taxis with bench seating so you’ll end up with a group of passengers going there

That would be a great anniversary present for the hubs and me!

We are on the 12 night Holy Land this October. We chose the 5 night plan. I plan to make reservations on the first 3 nights (embarkation and 2 sea days = plenty of time to enjoy a nice dinner). Night 4 will be when we are in Chania (Crete) as we leave there at 3:00. Night 5 will be our last sea day. We normally do UDP BUT I’ve heard enough from others that there may be nights you don’t even get back onboard until 7/8:00 at night. You either hit up windjammer and go to bed or get into the MDR in what you wore ashore. I just don’t think we will use it enough. We also are in a JS so will try to get into Coastal Kitchen for dinner once or twice if available.

Actually booked this back in March after being off Wonder for only 36 hours! Great ship and excited to sail her again. It’ll be our first cruise as Diamond Plus!

We never use them, especially oasis class. No one is ever in there. We did use the one on Mariner (sectioned off portion of Viking crown) and actually enjoyed it. That was pre-Covid. Used the concierge for something I can’t remember, he was great! We’re on odyssey in October out of Rome. 1st time on a quantum class. I don’t even know where the DL is but we will go find it and check it out. May use that concierge to book iFly and maybe our specialty dining

Sailing out of Rome you do not need a booster BUT if you want to get off, there are a handful of countries that require testing to get off the ship in port. However I expect that may change soon in the written protocols. They already are not testing on odyssey if you’re not boosted.

https://www.royalcaribbeanblog.com/2022/07/29/royal-caribbean-will-allow-unvaccinated-passengers-cruise-ships-early-august

What @berkeleykelsaid is correct. Barcelona is recognized as the primary embarkation port and the one available on the App

We saw him years ago on oasis and again this past March on Wonder. He’s so good!

Royal and NCL are comparable in the middle of the road/mainstream lines. Celebrity is a step above. NCL owns Oceania which is closer to Celebrity. Holland America and Princess are also comparable to Celebrity and Oceania. All of these more premium lines offer slightly different, unique itineraries versus Royal/NCL. I don’t think you could go wrong with any of them. We are approaching Diamond Plus with our next cruise with Royal (12 night Holy Land/Best of Greece-go check out that itinerary!) and will be entertaining Celebrity for our future European cruises, mostly due to itineraries (and a family member is their corporate executive chef!)

So here is what I found in an odyssey group on Facebook: We traveled on June 19th sailing. Our ports were in Italy, Turkey and Greece. We were a group of 10, which included 2 unvaxxed children (ages 4 and 9) and one in our party was fully vaccinated but “not considered up to date”. We all took an antigen test (easier to do it all at the same time) in Rome one day prior to sailing and the unvaxxed kids and “not up to date person” did not have to test again. Even though RCCL website had Greece listed as a country in the testing list. I hope this helps! We did have to show proof of vax upon boarding in Rome, but that is the only time.

Congratulations! We will be Diamond Plus in October after our 12 night Holy Land in a JS. With double points promo it only took us 4 cruises to get from Diamond to Diamond Plus. We will also get our 140 nights block on odyssey too Looking forward to the 5 drinks too. Our first Diamond Plus cruise will be Wonder next May.

I don’t understand why Greece is still on the list. Greece is not requiring anything anymore. I’ve read in some Odyssey groups that those without booster and outside 270 days are NOT being tested to leave the ship yet the website is still saying you do.

Greece is on RC’s list BUT they dropped all Covid stuff on May 1. https://www.cnn.com/travel/amp/greece-travel-covid-19/index.html

We always wait to pay in full until close to final payment date. Why let them have your money early? I’d rather have that money working for ME, not them. I also will ask my TA to check the difference between my refundable deposit and non refundable. If non refundable fare is less near final payment, we switch the deposit to non refundable. It’s not always less but my October Odyssey was close to $1800 less going with non refundable. That paid an airfare to Rome!

We’ve been self disembarking since 2011. Just bought AirTags though for our trip to Scotland next week. We’re doing carryon only for fear of lost bags but I’ve heard they’re making a lot of people gate check their carry ons. Just playing out worst case scenario’s because air travel right now is a total sh$tshow. Also bought train tickets this morning from London to Edinburgh because British airways is cancelling 1/3 of flights to Edinburgh, most being last minute

I think the everyday testing really hurt them. I’ve gotten sooooooooooo many emails from Viking with incredible deals.

We have a Holy Land/Greece on Odyssey coming up in October. I had read how slow tender service has been in Santorini so decided to see who was in port with us that day. None other than our first Royal Caribbean ship, Song of America, that we sailed in 1991-ish. She’s now Celestyal Olympia. Her Viking Crown however is still very prominent. Excited to see where it all began for us 31 years ago

The beach time was very limited. Maybe 45 minutes to an hour) I’d look for a boat tour that specifically includes beach time.

But will Viking continue testing passengers everyday onboard? That’d be a deal breaker for me

We were on Symphony in October. She still looked great (really only had about 1 1/2 years in service before Covid). Next was Wonder in March. Obviously had new ship smell . Was supposed to sail Radiance 2 weeks ago but got cold feet about possibly testing positive in Vancouver and being stuck in Canada. We moved that cruise to Harmony. I thought Harmony looked great. Next up is Odyssey in October. I expect her to still be looking good. (We will get our first block on that sailing! That is if Odyssey blocks are available yet) We have Wonder again next March. Then setting our sights on Icon. The only “oldie” on our radar is probably Jewel in 2024 Norwegian Fjords

Covid is all over the ships. Our Harmony last week has a bunch of Covid positive along with cases of Flu A. Our Radiance Alaska which we cancelled and moved to Harmony also had a lot of Covid and people stuck in Canada. Just about every ship sailing across all the lines are in the CDC Orange category. Masks didn’t seem to help either as several wore them inside the ship at all times and still got it

We’re in the same boat (booster wise lol). We sail out of Civitavecchia (Rome) in October and I’m hoping they relax the 270 day rule in Italy. We’re on a 12 night that includes Israel, Greece and Turkey. Israel may still be an issue. They’re pretty strict. Testing to get back to the US is a concern too

Yeah hubby said we can continue in suites but take less cruises. Nope! I did manage to convince him to upgrade to a JS for our 12 night Holy Land on Odyssey. By changing from Alaska to Harmony, that put us 12 points behind on reaching Diamond Plus so we took the left over Alaska $ from our refund and upgraded to JS to get quadruple points and push us over the finish line. Hopefully we can get in to CK a few nights!

We were with you on Harmony last week. We were in a grand suite. Had a blast! Loved Junior and Elaine. Rodrigo in CK was just so friendly. Loved all of it!