Celebrity Reflection Western Med May 29 Review

Hi everyone, we’re back from a fantastic cruise on Reflection, Western Med, May 29 2017. I never made a review before, and English is not my first language, so bear with me I’ll try my best…

First, about us: we’re a couple in our sixties (66-67) living way up north in Quebec City, Canada. We did two cruises before in the Caribbeans, Reflection in 2015 and Silhouette in 2016. We’ve never been to Europe, so we said it’s now or never.

We decided to spend 3 nights in Rome before the cruise to explore the Eternal City. After some research on Tripadvisor I booked a small hotel on Via Della Croce, near Piazza Di Spagna, which had good comments and was not too expensive, and also I wanted to be near the action.

So on may 25, off we go for the big adventure! Flight on Air Transat, Montreal to Rome took 8 hours, long, but smooth and no problem. I had booked Romecabs to pick us at the airport, the driver was waiting for us and drove us to our hotel, good friendly service. We arrived in the afternoon, so the first day we just walked the streets around the hotel to get the feeling of the place and get our marks, then a nice dinner and a good and long night sleep. (the first night we slept 12 hours in a row! must have been really exhausted after that long day).

Finally, we crossed the Atlantic and arrived in Italy!

Piazza Di Spagna, a 5 minute walk from our hotel

Had lunch in one of these little trattorias, good pizza and pasta!

Tiny elevator in our hotel, good for 2 maybe 3 (not too big) people.

Tomorrow morning, we're going to the Vatican!

Nice start! Enjoying your photos too! Following.

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I had bought tickets for Vatican Museums and the Colosseum on internet about 2 months before our cruise, so on saturday morning (I read the Vatican is closed for visits on sundays) we walked to Spagna metro station and ride 3 stations to Ottaviano-S.Pietro station. Rome metro looks quite old, bleak and not too well maintained.

The Vatican museums are really extraordinary, so vast and rich in culture, you could spend days there. Just one thing though, the Sistine Chapel is quite small and dark, I thought it would be much bigger and brighter like a church, but, as they said, it’s only a chapel. Our tickets were for 10 in the morning, not too crowded at this hour yet. We had a quick lunch in a restaurant of the museums (pizza, what else?) and proceeded to walk slowly to our hotel doing some sightseeing, passing by Castel San Angelo, on Angels bridge, etc.

St.Peter's Square

Castel San Angelo

Sunday morning, we took the metro again to the Colosseum, big, lots of rocks there...the Romans knew how to build things that last, impressive. And again we walked back to our hotel, stopping at Trevi Fountain and other landmarks.

Inside the Colosseum

Trevi Fountain, magnificent!

Tomorrow morning, we leave Rome, go to Civitavecchia, to the beautiful Reflection, another big day!

Security...in Rome, we noticed security is everywhere, polizia, carabinieri, army, everywhere, in every street, well we felt secure indeed. I guess that's the new order of things nowadays. Going down in a metro station, we see two heavily armed soldiers, on duty.

Hi Claudart, great start, looking forward to more. You have some amazing pictures. We were on the same cruise and we absolutely loved the ship, crew and itinerary.

Cheers!

Nick

Monday morning, may 29, we’re ready. This time I booked Rome Limousines to get us to Civitavecchia. The driver arrived just before 10. Civitavecchia is quite far from Rome, about an hour drive or more depending on traffic. Driver was nice and friendly, but a little impatient in Rome’s traffic…

Embarkation was a breeze, very well organized, took a few minutes. We had booked cabin 7201, deck 7, midship near the Hideaway and the elevators. We like this location, very convenient. Cabins would be ready at 12:30, so we waited and relaxed in the Hideaway with our carry-on luggage. Finally got to our cabin, very clean and nice and met out attendant Sandra, who would provide us excellent service throughout our cruise.

At 4:15 muster drill was on deck 5 and they showed a strange little film, James Bond’s like. I think they should keep it simple like on airplanes, just explaining emergency procedures and all would be finished in less than 10 minutes.

The Hideaway. There's a coffee station, opened from 8 to 5. Being an early riser, I would have liked a coffee at 7, I think 8 is a little late.

Our usual table in MDR, we had dinner there almost every night. Service and food were always excellent. I usually ordered 2 appetizers (Caesar salad and escargots or soup), entree and dessert (NY cheesecake or creme brulee)

So far, so good! Thanks for taking the time. I am enjoying the photos.

Ken

Thanks for this review, from a fellow Canadian, enjoying it and your pictures very much! We also love those two-tops along the rail...probably the most private of the 2tops in Select. Keep up the good work, we'd love to go back to the Med someday!

Cathy

Enjoying this as we are booked on the same cruise in the fall! Thanks!

May 30, for my DW birthday, I took her on a Celebrity excursion called: Coast of Cinque Terre & Portovenere. We had a glorious day in a beautiful place! The excursion starts at 7:45, so we have to get up early and eat a quick breakfast. We took bus, motorboat, train and had an excellent local guide named Julia. We spent a couple hours in Portovenere and in Monterosso.

Lots of tourists there, I can't imagine how it must be in july or august.

Some more pictures of Cinque Terre:

At the train station with our guide Julia.

At the gelateria

Cheers!

Claude

Celebrity Today front page for La Spezia. Notice that it is the only port where we had to take our passport with us. There was a check point before reentering ship.

Enjoying the photos! We will be in Rome in a few weeks so this review is timely.:)

Love your style of writing and following along with you ! Lovely photos too!

May 31, Villefranche. Another beautiful sunny day, we had decided to go to Nice. Tendering to port was fast, with no waiting. Nice little port, then we walked along Villefranche shorefront to the train station, about 20 minutes. I wanted to buy train tickets in the machine on the track, but it takes coins only (no bills) and my credit card did not work, si I had to go across the track to the tickets office and bought 2 round trip tickets to Nice Ville, OK, all set to go!

At Nice Ville station, we cross the street and take the tramway to go to old Nice, nice ride, then walk to Flower market , Promenade des Anglais, old town, beautiful city! Seeing so many flowers everywhere is a shock for us northerners.

We have lunch in a boulangerie/pâtisserie, the best croissants I ate in my life, I think I’ll go back to Nice just to taste those croissants again!

Time to go back to Villefranche, we take the tramway to the train station. But for a reason unknown to us the police is evacuating the station! Now what do we do? Do we wait and risk missing the ship? We decided not to take any chance, there’s a taxi stand near with 3 cars waiting, so we ask a driver to take us to Villefranche port.

The driver was named Jean-Marie, he was very friendly and talkative and he entertained us all along with stories about his city and region. The ride cost us 30 euros plus a lost train ticket but I think it was worth it.

The tender boat in Villefranche port.

Such a beautiful little port!

Villefranche main street.

In the flower market

The Statue of Liberty

The Nice train station (before the evacuation...)

Cheers

Claude

Following and enjoying your review, doing this very cruise in August so looking forward to the rest of your posts.

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Loving your review! We are doing this itinerary in the fall and we also plan to DIY to Nice. Might need to think about taking the bus after your little scare at the train station :)

Patti

Hi, this must have been an exceptional situation, but it's always a good idea to have a plan B. I would not hesitate to take the train again.

Hi, this must have been an exceptional situation, but it's always a good idea to have a plan B. I would not hesitate to take the train again.

I'm really enjoying your review. We're on the same cruise beginning 31 July, so all your tips are appreciated. Now I want to visit Nice just to taste those croissants!

Great Review, thanks!

We are doing this voyage on the Reflection in October. Hope our weather is as gorgeous as yours!

Barcelona! I have mixed feelings about Barcelona. Sure is a beautiful city, unique design and architecture. But the city is vast, more than I imagined, not a city you can walk. All interesting sites are quite far and scattered all over the city. So we thought the HOHO bus would be a nice idea to explore the city. We took Bus Turistic, getting down at some sites, and on again. A nice way to explore a city, but very time consuming.

At some point we got down at the stop named Park Guell, hoping to visit the park, only to note that we had to walk uphill for what seemed like half an hour to get to the park. Well, plans change, we saw a nice little shoe store on the street and we went shopping, Spain is the place to buy shoes, Rome was too expensive. So we hopped back on the bus with a bag containing 2 pairs of nice shoes. Next time if we want to visit Park Guell, we’ll take a taxi.

We saw plenty of superb sites, monuments, buildings in Barcelona, the most spectacular being Sagrada Familia, We had tickets for this fantastic church, the inside is as spectacular as the outside. They say it will be finished in 2026 but I doubt it.

It would take more than a day and a half to explore this city, we had just a quick glance. But to me this city just seems a little too perfect and square compared to Rome which I would describe as roundish and disorganized. Or, to use a metaphor, Barcelona is a brain and Rome is a heart.

I hope to return one day in Barcelona, take my time, maybe find a “heart”.

Beautiful architecture everywhere.

Barcelona taxis and the city in general reminded me of New York.

Superb large avenues, almost too perfect.

Suspended Christ over the altar.

Lunch in a small local restaurant, meals in Spain were always simple but delicious, made with fresh quality ingredients.

Quick question: Were there USB ports in the staterooms on Reflection? (I don't remember any on other X ships, but this will be my first cruise on a Solstice-class ship.) Thanks.

Thanks for the review.