A magical Mediterranean vacation live report UPDATED 7/15 About This Page:

[chezp]

Originally Posted by lauriep

It's so great that you'll have friends on board for this, just like your last Med cruise-- although for that one, if I'm remembering correctly, you had LOTS of friends!

You do remember correctly, although ironically we only knew about Bruce and Marta ahead of time, and that's because Bruce was posting his trip report as they did the repositioning cruise here. We were lucky enough to be opposite Deb Wills' room, bumped into her on the first day. I of course knew her, and was shocked to discover she knew of me, and from there, we were introduced to so many great friends, including Mari and Raleigh!

Makes it so much nicer, especially at mealtime.

The irony is I think about the only time we'll see them is mealtimes, as I don't think we're on any excursions together...

I like your choice of excursions. It's so hard because there's a lot to see in Athens, but the new Acropolis Museum is a gem and not to be missed. The design of the museum itself, and the use of natural light in the galleries-- amazing.

Good to know.

I love Delos, but it's true that the boat ride over can be quite choppy. If you can, I'd back out if the weather and the seas look even a bit iffy. I'm a huge fan of the ancient ruins and can visit them day after day without getting bored, but that may not be the case for you and it's not worth feeling ill all day to see another site.

Ok, that's very good advice - and I'll be sure to take some seasickness meds, just to be on the safe side...

Mykonos itself is everything the guidebooks say-- it's touristy and crowded. I love it, though. To me it has its own charm and if you wander a bit away from the central areas it can be wonderful to explore the whitewashed back streets and poke into the shops. I don't want to discourage you completely from Delos, but just want you to know if you decide not to do that excursion you can have a nice day wandering on your own on Mykonos.

Again, that is good to know. Thanks so much for your input - I knew you'd have invaluable advice for me.

[manticorjenn]

Sounds like another wonderful adventure. I can't wait to read your TR and see another of the many places I dream about visiting.

[cubfancolleen]

I was initially happy to hear your flights came out under budget, but worried they didn't stay there in time for you to book them. That's what we're watching now, as we have a month still before we can book flights to Vancouver and home from Seattle for the Alaska cruise. I detest flight pricing!

[SuperDave]

Looks like some great plans and hope the flights work out for the two of you! Don't like that upcoming post teaser!

Here's a few suggestions for dining. In Venice I went to a great restaurant not far from the Rialto Bridge. It's actually, in the Cannareggio section of town. If you're coming from St. Marks you go past Rialto and the restaurant is off to the right, about a five minute walk from Rialto. Here it is below. It's a little expensive, family run and quite good.

http://www.tripadvisor.com/Restauran...ce_Veneto.html

There is another good one in Padova, where I had lunch. It's not far from the Basilica Saint Antonio. It's called Antico Brolo. It has an enclosed terrace and is great as a sun room having a nice lunch.

Ristorante Antico Brolo, Padua - Restaurant Reviews - TripAdvisor

[chezp]

Originally Posted by cubfancolleen

I was initially happy to hear your flights came out under budget, but worried they didn't stay there in time for you to book them. That's what we're watching now, as we have a month still before we can book flights to Vancouver and home from Seattle for the Alaska cruise. I detest flight pricing!

Isn't it just frustrating waiting for flights to open up?

[chezp]

Originally Posted by SuperDave

Looks like some great plans and hope the flights work out for the two of you! Don't like that upcoming post teaser!

Here's a few suggestions for dining. In Venice I went to a great restaurant not far from the Rialto Bridge. It's actually, in the Cannareggio section of town. If you're coming from St. Marks you go past Rialto and the restaurant is off to the right, about a five minute walk from Rialto. Here it is below. It's a little expensive, family run and quite good.

Vini da Gigio, Venice - Restaurant Reviews - TripAdvisor

There is another good one in Padova, where I had lunch. It's not far from the Basilica Saint Antonio. It's called Antico Brolo. It has an enclosed terrace and is great as a sun room having a nice lunch.

Ristorante Antico Brolo, Padua - Restaurant Reviews - TripAdvisor

Thanks - I'll add that into our itinerary.

[SuperDave]

Originally Posted by chezp

Thanks - I'll add that into our itinerary.

Glad I can be of help! I'm sure, I'll be making a few more suggestions before your trip!

Scrovegni Chapel and the Archeological Museum in Padova are both worth a visit! I hope I don't wind up doing too much planning for you!

[KMB733]

Glad the flights worked out for you and that you'll have friends joining you!!

[chezp]

Originally Posted by SuperDave

Glad I can be of help! I'm sure, I'll be making a few more suggestions before your trip!

Scrovegni Chapel and the Archeological Museum in Padova are both worth a visit! I hope I don't wind up doing too much planning for you!

Got the Scrovegni Chapel already. As you'll find out later in this pre-trip report, booking tickets for it has been a nightmare. I don't think I do have the Archaeological Museum, but we may not have time for it...

[SuperDave]

Originally Posted by chezp

Got the Scrovegni Chapel already. As you'll find out later in this pre-trip report, booking tickets for it has been a nightmare. I don't think I do have the Archaeological Museum, but we may not have time for it...

I was on a tour so the Scrovegni Chapel tix were all set. It's quite unique as you'll find out, but not in ways you expect! I won't give anything away!

[Roxie2006]

This sounds like an extremely awesome cruise. I cannot wait to read about it. With the itinerary you have, this will make for a wonderful journey especially when great friends will be joining you!!

[Linnynad]

YEAH!! I've been looking forward to the TR because, I too, want to cruise the med again and just really have no clue when it will be. With kids now though ( as we didn't have them when we sailed before) I know it will be with Disney for sure!!
Our cruise ended in Venice and the days approaching the end, the Capt. would continue to tell us to make sure we get up early and watch us coming into port because the views are so stunning as we are up so high and can really look down upon the whole city. I did set the alarm to get up and was glad I did
We sailed in 2004 one month before the summer Olympics in Athens, and that was so neat to see the flame lit at that time.
Kusdassi turned out to be way more interesting than I ever expected. Probably one of the best excursions I have ever taken in my life, mainly because I didn't know much about this port. We had a tour to Ephesus and visited the old ruins and the house of the Virgin Mary, I learned a very cool fact about the term of the "Red Carpet" and how Cleopatra had a big part to play on that ( I don't want to spoil this if you don't already know, so I'll keep quiet) We traveled back and went to a small demo on oriental rugs and they gave us apple tea and a small sandwich, it was so odd but fun at the same time.
Pashimina's are the "BIG" going item to buy here and as I hemmed and hauled over which color to buy, I would up only getting 2, in black and tan. Later that night a CM onboard asked me if I stocked up on them because they are an amazing deal ..................I then felt so down because I didn't even think of buying way more in many colors and using them as gifts. Eh.............live and learn I guess.

Looking forward to hearing soo much more !!!

[chezp]

Originally Posted by Linnynad

YEAH!! I've been looking forward to the TR because, I too, want to cruise the med again and just really have no clue when it will be. With kids now though ( as we didn't have them when we sailed before) I know it will be with Disney for sure!!
Our cruise ended in Venice and the days approaching the end, the Capt. would continue to tell us to make sure we get up early and watch us coming into port because the views are so stunning as we are up so high and can really look down upon the whole city. I did set the alarm to get up and was glad I did

Oooh.... good tip! Fortunately, we won't have that issue, as we'll be coming into Venice in the late afternoon...

We sailed in 2004 one month before the summer Olympics in Athens, and that was so neat to see the flame lit at that time.

Seriously jealous! You know how much of an Olympics fan I am, so that sounds amazing!

Kusdassi turned out to be way more interesting than I ever expected. Probably one of the best excursions I have ever taken in my life, mainly because I didn't know much about this port. We had a tour to Ephesus and visited the old ruins and the house of the Virgin Mary, I learned a very cool fact about the term of the "Red Carpet" and how Cleopatra had a big part to play on that ( I don't want to spoil this if you don't already know, so I'll keep quiet) We traveled back and went to a small demo on oriental rugs and they gave us apple tea and a small sandwich, it was so odd but fun at the same time.

I'm glad you didn't spoil that, as I don't know about that. It'll be interesting to see if they cover that on our tour. If they don't, then you'll have to fill us in...

Pashimina's are the "BIG" going item to buy here and as I hemmed and hauled over which color to buy, I would up only getting 2, in black and tan. Later that night a CM onboard asked me if I stocked up on them because they are an amazing deal ..................I then felt so down because I didn't even think of buying way more in many colors and using them as gifts. Eh.............live and learn I guess.

Looking forward to hearing soo much more !!!

Another good tip!

[chezp]

Pre-trip report – part four: how much have those flights gone up by?

Wednesday 31 July 2013:

Now where did I leave the last installment? Oh, that’s right – I’d just got home and was logging on to buy the flights that were listed as £290 that morning. Well, I discovered that they’d rocketed up to £360 in just 12 hours! I couldn’t believe it.

I started to play with some other prices, and both Turin and Nice flights had also gone up. Whereas they’d been £220 that morning, they were now showing as £260. Now bear in mind this was for return flights. I was about to suck it up and pay for a flight back from one or the other, when I suddenly thought I’d check out the Avios site. Avios used to be Airmiles, and you can use them for British Airways flights, as well as many other things.

I checked Genoa… nothing. I checked Turin… nothing. I checked Nice… result! I could get a flight out of there using my Avios. Ok – that works! I went ahead and booked it, although I was unsure whether you get a luggage allowance with it, as British Airways have now introduced two tier pricing. The cheaper price is for no luggage, the more expensive one entitles you to a case each. I was really impressed when I got the confirmation emailed through, and sure enough, luggage was included in the price.

Ok, so now to book our flight out to Venice. I looked at using our Avios again, but it was a lot pricier, which seemed odd, given that this was the cheaper of the two flights and it wasn’t the flight I wanted. I wanted the morning one, not the afternoon one, so I decided to go ahead and pay out of pocket. It came to just £113, which I thought was really good value (see what I mean about it being cheaper ) and I decided to pay an extra £20 to pick our seats, as the emergency exit seats were available, and the faithful Seat Guru website told me they were good seats. Oh well, nice way to start our vacation off then…

So finally we have our flights, and even though the cruise has been booked for some time, somehow it’s always a lot more real when the flights are bought.

Friday 23 August 2013

I appreciate there hasn’t been an update for some time, but finally today there is. I went to have a look on Hotels.com to see if the hotel I want to stay in in Venice is available yet, as I figured it’s now less than 11 months out, and maybe it is. Well, it is! It’s about £200 (c. $300) for a standard room, although I must admit either the suite or the Grand Canal view room appeal, although they’re £280 (c. $420) – and remember this is just for one night.

Now I appreciate that’s a lot of money, but this hotel is ranked in the top 10 of all Venice hotels on TripAdvisor, and as you can imagine, there are a heck of a lot of hotels in Venice! It’s also a lot cheaper than the other hotels in the top 10, and best of all, it’s well located, near to the station, and also the port. I think we could just walk there from the station, which would be a huge bonus.

I thought about booking, then I realised that soon we’d have another “free” night with Hotels.com. I put it in quotation marks, as it’s not really what it says on the tin. They take your average spend over 10 nights, and then that’s what they credit back to you for your free night. Well, we should have enough stays by the time we get back from Switzerland in just over a fortnight’s time. At the moment, we have an £87 credit, and of course, depending on how much our upcoming stays are, that could go up or down, but heck, it would reduce the cost.

So, despite the fact that the suite and Grand Canal view were only showing a few rooms left, I decided to wait until we got back and apply our free night’s credit. I’m a great believer in fate, and if it was meant to be for us to have one of those rooms, then they’ll still be available when I go to book, and if it wasn’t meant to be, then they won’t be available – simple as that.

Wednesday 11 September 2013

We are now booked into our hotel for Venice for the night before our cruise, but it’s not the place I was looking at before we went to Switzerland. So what happened? Well, the hotel still had availability, but I was still having issues with paying out this much money for just one night, as it was a lot of money.

I had a quick browse around to see if there was anywhere else I was missing near the station, as the last time I’d checked, most hotels weren’t showing availability, and maybe there was better availability now There was, and I found a place, the Abbazia de Luxe, which was a bed and breakfast in the right location, well rated on TripAdvisor, and it also had a Grand Canal view, all for £170. Well, if I’m going to save £100, I’ll take that then! Even better, you don’t have to pay until you check out, and there’s free cancellation, so I went ahead and booked.

Saturday 21 September 2013

We have another piece of the jigsaw now in place. We are booked for our two nights in Florence at the Silla Hotel. It’s rated in the top 60 out of nearly 500 hotels in Florence in TripAdvisor, and comes complete with free breakfast and Internet, and the parking is a reasonable price, much cheaper than other hotels in Florence, so that’s a bonus. It’s a pay upfront hotel, so that’s all paid for, which is good, and best of all, it’s only £172 (c. $275), which is as much as one night in Venice. That sounds like a good deal to me!

I contacted Mari to let her know what progress I’d made to date, figuring she’d go ahead and make similar bookings, but she thought I was going to book for them as well. I ended up saying that she’d need to book Florence, as our booking was non-refundable, so I couldn’t go back and change it to two rooms, which she did. She’s going to get Beci, from MouseFan Travel to book one of the Disney hotels for the night before the cruise, which is fair enough. Mark did ask me about that, but I suspect our booking is going to be a lot cheaper than anything Disney can offer us…

Saturday 4 January 2014

Well, as you can see, I’ve done nothing further on this vacation for some time, something to do with taking our vacation to Disney and Aulani in the meantime, but now it’s 2014, so it’s time to look again at this, and to see how our plans are shaping up, especially as the cruise will need to be fully paid off soon, and then it’ll be time for booking things like Palo!

Mari messaged me to say just to let her know whenever I plan on booking any hotels, and then she’ll go ahead and book the same thing, which works well. She also pointed out that a lot of the places in Verona, Vicenza and Padua close on a Monday, and guess what day we’re planning to visit those cities? You got it! A Monday…. Ok, so time to do a bit of changing around then…

Now we’re going to Brescia, which Raleigh’s asked to visit, and then the towns around Lake Garda on the Monday, followed by Verona, Vicenza and Padua on the Tuesday, so that works better. As to whether the rest of our original itinerary fits, well… that remains to be seen…

Monday 6 January 2014

I got an email tonight, offering discounts on airport parking, and airport hotels. As with all emails like this, I checked out the offers. The airport hotel with parking wasn’t that great a price, but when I went to check out the airport parking on its own, I was staggered to find a really good price for 17 nights valet parking for just £56 (about $90). Now bearing in mind I’ve paid £30 in the past just for a long weekend of three nights, that’s exceptional value. I did check the company out, as I wondered if it was just too good to be true, but no they seemed to be all in order, so I went ahead and booked. One more thing ticked off the list!

Next: the cruise is now how much?

[lauriep]

Making good progress! Sounds like you got good deals for the hotels in both Florence and Venice and very good flights. I hate making those decisions as you never know if you'll get something better if you wait. I usually book early, as it's worth it to me to have it all settled.