Seas2mountains

To fight the Zzzzz monster, we went for a walk around the city. Anyone interested in a ride on the Boogie Bus?

Trip Advisor “restaurants nearby” function claimed a German bar called Stein Garten was open. Thankfully, they said they could now serve food when we got there at 4pm. ordered a salad and schnitzel which came with chicken and pork schnitzel plus fries and red cabbage. It was good but I would not order it again. The salad was excellent. It was all too much food snd I feel bad with how much food we left behind and wasted. My husband ordered a frankfurter with fries and Sauer kraut. He said it was good. We found a local store for snacks before checking out the medieval walls around the city called Bargate. We then struggled to stay awake. A shower made us feel so much better.

We left LHR at about 1:30pm and got to our hotel in Southampton about 3:00pm. It was such a gorgeous day weather wise with sunny skies and a temperature of 74 degrees. After checking in, we were focused on finding food at an odd time after lunch but before dinner. We tried going to Duke of Wellington and they were open for drinks but they said they didn’t serve food until 6pm. It looked like a good place and had good reviews so that was disappointing.

I’m more excited to visit Bruges knowing it’s on your list. I also liked Venice and Rome but have not been to Corfu. in Europe, I would add Salzburg, Austria and the surrounding area in the Alps. One other location that was fascinating to me and I want to see again is Pompeii in Italy.

You weren’t rude at all! Congrats on being called a magical unicorn. You have such an upbeat and positive yet funny personality to share here at CC and I can only imagine how you brighten the day for many others especially those you see in person. We have some favorite places, too, and look forward to discovering some locations that may require a future visit.

Thank you! I’m sorry to hear you weren’t able to go to Bruges and Akureyi. I can imagine how disappointing it had to be yet was not anything NCL could fix. We heard the dock for Isofjordur is open this year as that sounds like it was another missed port in Iceland. Happy 47th Anniversary!

If you find yourself with time and access, feel free to add your thoughts, Have a wonderful cruise!

Thank you! That’s nice that you will be able to do more exploring of nearby countries next summer. I’m jealous! Enjoy your upcoming cruises! I’ll do my best to share more about the Prima.

When we decided to fly in a day earlier than we originally planned, we debated spending the first and possibly the second night in London to have time to explore in the area. After reading about Southampton, we decided it was a better idea to spend all three nights there before the cruise. Since I spent a few days in London many years ago to see the main tourists areas, I don’t feel like I missed anything. We considered using the National Express bus from LHR to a stop near the hotel, but the 2 hour gap to wait for a bus if our flight was delayed has us reconsider this plan. We decided to use a car service instead. Someone the CC forum for British Island travels recommended BlackBerry Cars. We had a great experience as the driver was professional, on time and drove safely. We do recommend them. I’ll share more about the hotel with photos after we check out on Sunday.

We are in London. The flight was only a few minutes late. It was a peaceful and quiet flight. I got about an hour of sleep and feel fine now while my husband got about 3 hours of sleep. It was about a 12 minute walk using escalators and walkways to get from the plane to passport control automated scanners. The machine scanned our passports and did facial recognition and then the gate opened. Our bags were ready about 10 minutes later and we walked out the exit in terminal 2 with no customs checks.

Our flight is delayed slightly but is expected to make up time flying over the pond. We are flying a day earlier than planned and at a later time to take advantage of an upgrade option. We should be taking off soon.

Robots in airline lounge to move dirty dishes.

It was a busy day doing last minute errands, tasks and packing. I had some eggs for breakfast but skipped lunch as I wasn’t hungry. The Airline lounge has plenty of hot and cold food options. I picked chicken piccata, mashed potatoes and grilled zucchini. The chicken was delicious and the zucchini tasted fresh and was perfectly prepared. My husband got a Chipotle chicken sandwich with cheese on the side. He really likes cheese. He said it was good.

We each checked one large suitcase which was so easy to check as there were no lines. My suitcase is 16 pounds heavier than it was for a 7 day warm weather cruise on Breakaway almost a month ago. I packed a lot of layers for Iceland and more toiletries for the additional week of travel. My husband’s suitcase is 5 pounds heavier. My husband tries to help me with my bag since he is a wonderful husband but I try to be Army tough by handling it myself and don’t want him to deal with the consequences of my over packing issues. As the day and time were off peak for travel, there was hardly a line in TSA Pre check. We are waiting in an airline lounge as we got here earlier than we normally do for flights. First drinks were a white blend for my husband and a red blend for me.

Thank you! At the end of the cruise, I expect to say that both are beautiful for different reasons.it is difficult to see some areas of Alaska without access to a plane or helicopter. It is such a personal and subjective answer as you pointed out.

Thank you! Hope you have a great cruise next year. Thank you for following along.

Thank you! I hope you will be able to go on this itinerary in the future.

Thank you! Your recent wonderful live review on the Prima was really helpful and inspired me to do this one to try to share some photos and our experience. Feel free to add your own Prima comments at any time. I hope you will do a live review on Cunard.

This will be our first time on the Prima. I’ll do my best to share more about our experience on the ship along with the itinerary. Feel free to ask any questions.

Thank you so much! I get so hooked on the Live reviews that I know how boring it is when they end. I have been on a boat (not a cruise ship) in the Norwegian fjords and I think the height of the mountains on both sides and the color of the water makes it one of the most beautiful places in the world. I hope you will get to see the Norwegian fjords in person someday, too.

Here is the weather forecast for Southampton (Thursday-Sunday), Bruges (Monday), and Amsterdam (Tuesday). Looks perfect or almost perfect to me. Warm clothes are packed for Norway and Iceland where it will be much colder.

Today is travel day! We are mostly packed and have a few last minute errands to run before we leave to catch our night flight to London. We will stay in Southampton for 3 nights before embarking on the Prima on Sunday. I created a 20 page document with photos and fun facts for our 9 year old granddaughter to follow along on our cruise to include information about each country and port locations. She recently cruised with us on the Breakaway last month with her auntie (our daughter) and auntie's boyfriend. This was our granddaughter's fourth cruise with us and she thinks it is very "rude" of us to go on another cruise without her. My husband asked for a copy of the 20 page document so he would know where we are going and what we are doing! Ha ha!

Here is our itinerary.

I have absolutely loved reading the many Live reviews that keep coming in this forum. Thank you to all who are contributing. I will make an attempt to give back with mostly live information from our experience with photos. However, if the live review gets to be too much, My husband and I will be traveling on this adventure. We both have been to Europe but it has been many, many years since we have been there with the exception of a business trip to London about 10 years ago and a cruise in the Mediterranean about 12 years ago . I lived in Germany and served in Bosnia while in the Army. This meant that I was able to travel to many European locations including Norway, Sweden, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Italy and the UK but this was about 25+ years ago. My husband was a pilot in the Air Force and he flew to many locations in Europe. We are super excited to see these locations on this itinerary together. The weather is looking fairly decent for the first few days of the cruise. I read some comments on a recent live review about whether Norway is more beautiful than Alaska. My last live review was on the Spirit for a B2B in Alaska last June/July. I'll do my best to include photos of Norway so you can decide.

I wondered the same thing. Why get bothered to have the butler bring bad coffee at 6am when the Nespresso maker produces decent, consistent coffee on demand?