JayhawkCruiser23

We are taking our first Virgin Voyages cruise and our first cruise out of Miami. Our flight gets in at 10am, but with Virgins later boarding times, we will have a couple hours to kill. Thought is to take an Uber to somewhere where we can walk around, explore and grab some local eats for lunch. What is the best area or neighborhood to visit? 

And, yes I already know the risks for flying in day of. 

Hi @PurpleShamrock317 

Did you do this? We go in a couple weeks and was debating doing this. Did the bus work for you and how did you like the turtle centre? 

Thanks! 

First time going to Cozumel, and wanting to know what there is to do within walking distance of the port. We are coming on RCI, so I think that's international terminal from what I've seen.

We will have our 1yo with us and trying to not bring our carseat along for taxis or other transport. We are fairly active, so walking long distances doesn't bother us. 

My husband and I are looking to do our first cruise post Covid/new baby. We are looking at doing: 

1. Perfect Day/Nassau (4night) 

2. Key West/Nassau(4night)

3. Cozumel/Grand Cayman(5night)

We have done CocoCay (before it was Perfect Day) and Nassau previously, but willing to go again if its the better choice with a little one. Our little one will be between 1-1.5 years old for the dates we are looking.

Thanks!

Hello! I believe we will be on the Jewel at the same time! I have not been to Mykonos before, so this is all from my research. We are planning on going to a different beach in Mykonos, so I haven't looked too closely at information for Paradise beach. We plan on taking the local bus and here is the bus schedule for Mykonos: https://www.mykonosbus.com/index.en.html From a few posts I have seen, it is around 2 euro each way and about a 15-20 minute drive. From looking at the website, it looks like you can go to Paradise Beach from the Old Town bus station and the Fabrika bus station.

I have also read in the Rick Steves book that there is a shuttle boat that connects the southern beaches for around 3 euro - but not from Old Town - if you were wanting to beach hop.

I hope this helps!

3rd Option, how about finding another real tour from a reputable tour operator that runs the tour you want to do, and does it earlier? You'll save up to 50% off the ship's tour cost and have a much smaller group. This way you can go to Fira and Oia after, and not waste time.

 

In our 20+ years of cruising we have only ever taken the ship tour 3 times. Since you aren't getting off the ship as soon as they arrive, and there is no way you'll be late getting back, there is little benefit to the ship's tour.

Thank you for your response! I found a few tour operators that do the tour, but it is either in the morning (we arrive at 1pm) or it includes the hot springs. We are not interested in smelling like sulfur all day from swimming, or sitting on the boat while everyone else swims while adding extra 45+minutes to our boat ride.

We were not planning on taking a ship tour, but that one interested us and I heard that it is recommended often to do a ship tour for Santorini due to getting off the ship quicker. But since that tour is not doing that for us we agree that its not worth it.

At this point we have decided to tender to the old port and take a boat to Oia. Although hiking a volcano has a bragging/coolness factor to it, we decided it wasn't worth it to skip Oia as everyone comments how that is the "can't miss spot." Maybe next time ;)

We will be in Santorini in August from 1pm-10pm. I had read that it is better to do shore excursions from the ship as you get off quicker. The excursion we picked is the Scenic Kaiki Ride and Volcano Hike where you take a boat ride over to Nea Kameni and hike to the crater. My DH and I enjoy hiking and have never seen a volcano so thought it would be a great experience. When I booked it I thought it was going to be from 2pm-4:30pm after reading the excursion brochure; but on my cruise planner it states it is 3pm-5:30pm. I had thought we would have enough time to still go to Oia if it got done at 4:30, but now I don't think we would (last tender at 9pm). I am also concerned that since it doesn't start til 3pm, we will be wasting time waiting on the ship to tender over to the New Port. I have seen on someone's trip report and in Rick Steves guide that there are excursions from Old Port to the volcano, as well as the boats to Oia.

So my main question is: should we dump the ship's shore excursion and just do the volcano hike on our own from the Old Port followed by going to Oia? Or forget about the volcano hike all together and just visit Oia and Fira? Or stay with the ship's excursion?-If this, what should we do after the excursion?

Hello! Did you end up doing this? If so did you enjoy it? We are thinking about doing this as well on our upcoming cruise.

Thank you for your quick responses!

Hey, I'm piggy backing of OP's question but since mine is similar thought I would ask here. I redeemed points for OBC on 5/21. We have not seen it yet in the Cruise Planner. When we redeemed points for money off the cruise it posted in a couple of days. Should I contact someone or will it just magically appear? I wanted to use it to buy drink packages before our cruise at the end of July.

Is it possible to use gift cards (like Visa or MasterCard) in Italy? And if it is possible, it it easy to use and is the exchange rate good? Or are there extra fees with it?

With anniversary and birthdays before our trip, family is wanting to get us something to we could use on the trip and brought up gift cards. But I can't find if they are able to be used internationally or not.

Thanks in advance!

Try this: http://www.royalcaribbean.com/beforeyouboard/shoreExcursions/downloadBrochure/

 

No idea if this still works, but it used to create a downloadable PDF.

This does still work as this is the website I used to look at our shore excursions. After you get to your brochure there is an option to print in the top right corner. From here you can choose to save as a PDF instead of printing.

Unsure of the answer to your question, but you might try a different browser. Cruise Planner sends me to a broken page when I click for online check-in in Chrome, but I was able to access it when I tried in Edge.

This helped me! I was getting ready to start a thread about this but looked at open threads first. Thanks for the help!

Started reading your review as we are going to be on the Jewel in July. I am having so much fun following along! I have even started reading your previous reviews when I get caught up on this one. I really love the detail and pictures you put into your reviews. We don't have much experience on cruises (yet) but your reviews have gotten me excited about continuing to cruise. Anyway, I just wanted to thank you for putting all the time and effort in, it is much appreciated!

TripAdvisor has a forum related to booking 2018 Colosseum tickets on your own through the website, especially the underground tour.

Hello! I have been researching Rome on here and other travel websites for a couple months now. I feel like I have a pretty good idea of an itinerary, but would like some feedback on it from those that have been there before. This is at the end of July, beginning of August. We will hit the free Sundays, but as those are embarkation/debarkation days anyway, plan to stay away from the museums on those days. We will be arriving 3 days before our cruise departure, and leave 2 days following cruise return.

Part 1

Thurs: Arrive in morning - check in and walk around Rome, getting our bearings before an aperitivo and then early sleep.

Fri: Colosseum, Roman Forum & Palatine Hill with online tickets - plan to get there when it opens. Then explore area around Colosseum like churches and Capitoline Hill.

Sat: Borghese Gallery with picnic in gardens. See Spanish Steps, Trevi Fountain, Pantheon, and Piazza Navona.

Sun: Walk around Campo de Fiori before heading to cruise ship.

Part 2

Sun: Return from cruise ship - hope to take a post-cruise tour of Roman countryside before coming back to Rome

Mon: 7:00am - St. Peter’s Basilica with dome @8am. Vatican Museums following. (I see they have you select a time for the museum entrance; do you have to be there right at that time, early or can you be after that time? Also, how long do we need to plan to stay at St. Peter’s before heading over to the museums?) Explore Trastevere or anything we haven’t seen yet/want to see again.

Tues: Fly home

I realize it is going to be busy no matter what, so just seeing how much a specific day of the week matters. Any feedback is welcome! Thank you!

We just booked a driver to pick us up from our hotel in Rome, take us to the gardens in Tivoli, and then bring us to the port to board our cruise afterwards.

Which company are you using? I am looking at doing a pre or post cruise tour outside of Rome.

Had to reset my password yesterday and was finally able to get in. But I have not been able to get into Cruise Planner or make a payment on cruise yet. They do have current cruise and past cruise on there, but so far not liking the new website.

I am glad the thread is proving to be useful.

 

One post a couple of pages back stated Uber is sometimes more expensive than a taxi in Italy.

 

Once you have made your flight arrangements you may find others on your role call on the same flight.

 

Have you checked on flights from Air2Sea? I have found their prices to be good for international travel--not, so much for domestic travel.

 

 

The last time we were in Europe we used the Verizon International plan. We did not need to unlock the phone or get any sim cards. They charge a certain amount per day [depends on country] and you can use your talk, text, data on one devise as if you are in the US. It gave me a lot of piece of mind, YMMV You may not need to use it every day.[ lodging may have internet, etc] You only pay for the day if you actually use it. We paid $5/day for Spain. However, some countries were $10.

Thanks for the info on phone and Uber info.

I've been watching flight prices on Air2Sea and other sites; right now Air2Sea is a little higher. Probably going to keep watching for another 2 weeks before booking. Right now our roll call only has one other person, so will wait to see if others join or not.

First off, thank you so much DragonoftheSeas for starting this thread!

DH and I are going on a cruise in July 2018 embarking from Rome. As this will be our first time outside of the USA, travel and transfers are very high on my planning priority list. I had seen a few mentions of using UBER, but that consists of using your phone and data. What is the best way to have data in Europe? Getting a sim card or paying for international data with cellphone company?

We have only booked the cruise so far, no flight or hotel. We are looking at having at least 2 full days before cruise, and 1-2 days after (ex get in on Thursday, cruise leaves Sunday - cruise gets back Sunday, leave Tuesday). Planning on staying at an AirBnB possibly in the Trastevere area.

I got Rick Steves Rome pocketbook so we are not planning on doing any tours in Rome, just making sure to buy our tickets online before we leave and use his audio tours. After reading this thread though, I will definitely be looking into tours to/from the port.

Dang this post is old ... 🤦*♂️

 

 

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It was still very much appreciated!