girlguide

No problem. I was able to log in to both my bookings this morning.

Hopefully we will be on this cruise! We were supposed to do this March 2020, but the pandemic put an end to that. We will be on the November 16 Icon Aegean 4 nighter before boarding the Crystal. This is our second time on the Crystal - we did a 7 night circle Cuba a few years ago & really enjoyed the cruise. Looking forward to being back on board.

We were originally booked to do this March 2020, but like everyone else we were cancelled. We'll see if things are ready for this date! This is the first part of a back to sort of back. After we disembark on November 20th, we will be embarking on the Celestyal Crystal November 21 for the 7 night 3 Continents itinerary.

I hope these are a go. The itineraries don't line up like this again and I also noticed the 2021/2022 itineraries do not include as many excursions. Celestyal honoured our prices paid on both original reservations & gave us some OBC for both sailings.

On 2/13/2020 at 6:40 AM, rool said:

I just wanted to come back to say that I have had confirmation that the included Cairo/Pyramids excursion is still going ahead.

The one with the Nile cruise has been cancelled as it was felt that there wasn't enough time in the day for this to be done.

I'm perfectly happy with that.

There is a couple on You-tube posting videos of their experience doing this cruise in December - search for EECC travels

So far they have posted stuff about Athens, boarding the ship, day at sea, ship tour & the first 3 ports of call. On one of the videos she talks about the other Egypt excursion with the Nile cruise - she said they needed 80 signed up to run the excursion & so far they only had 20. So I'm not surprised they have cancelled that one & only offer the included excursion. Check out the videos if you can, they had a great time on the cruise. We're really looking forward to the trip.

7 hours ago, mo12-pak said:

what did everybody do in Cyprus?? (Limassol)  Need suggestions!

We'll be in Limassol March 25 (we're on the March 21 itinerary) our plan is to use the hop on hop off bus to get around to see the sites.

https://city-sightseeing.com/en/145/cyprus/1794/hop-on-hop-off-limassol

currently showing as unavailable, but hopefully by the time we are there it will be running.

Final payment made and e-ticket received. 

Final payment made & the e-ticket immediately arrived in my email inbox. 
 

The first cruisers on this new itinerary will be heading out this week. Hopefully some will post of their experience!

mmm the reply with the visa info has disappeared. I'm just about to make final payment on our cruises - the info that was posted about the Egypt visa was accurate.

Helen - I would love to hear about your experience on this itinerary. Have fun!

anyone else on this cruise..................

If you've done this itinerary before  would love to hear of your experience

On 11/14/2019 at 10:19 AM, helengp said:

Hello. We are booked on this cruise in December....leaving Athens on the 8th. This will be our first ever cruise.....very excited. One thing I can not get a definitive answer on, is do we need a visa for the trip in Egypt? We leave the ship at Alexandria and have a day visiting the pyramids and Cairo before rejoining the ship in the evening at Port Said. 

I contacted the cruise line and they said no visa required! But Egyptian consulate website suggests everyone visiting needs a tourist visa (can be got on-line as an e-visa) so I wondered if anyone knew any more about this?

 

We will do our own thing in Israel......no visa there i think.

 

any ideas/advice very welcome,

thanks

Helen

 

 

Hi Helen

You should look on your home country's website for travel/visa information.

We are Canadian and found the information regarding visas on the government of Canada website - under travel - travel advice and advisories.

travel.gc.ca/travelling/advisories

We will need visas for the Egypt stop but not any of the other stops. We don't need a visa for Turkey because we are stopping for the day on a cruise - if we were staying longer we would need a visa.

For anyone on this cruise - I'm booking a day trip with Guided Tours Israel for a tour of Jerusalem & Bethlehem. Room for more - there's 2 of us and they will take up to 16. Details are at

www.guidedtoursisrael.com/shore-excursions/from-ashdod-port/jerusalem-shore-excursions/

1 minute ago, CanadianBurger said:

Just what I need... another beverage...

Just had ours delivered. One per stateroom not one per person. That’s new - always received one each on other short cruises. I guess dh & I are sharing the drink. 

1 hour ago, CanadianBurger said:

Had to call room service to ask where my mini bar setup was. I was informed that I could NOT substitute the liquor minis. But apparently I will be getting the full complement of 8, unlike previous 1-day voyages. 

We boarded late after having brunch with our Seattle family. Called room service just before 2 for our mini bar. No problem trading for 10 beer & 10 perrier. It was delivered cold in about 10 minutes. 

Now we hear no reservations for the specialty restaurants just first come first serve. We’ll try our luck later. 

Have you looked at Celestyal Cruises? They are a Greek cruiseline out of Pireaus (Athens). Small cruiseline with 2 ships offering 3, 4, 5 or 7 night itineraries.

We are doing a 4 night itinerary followed by the 7 night 3 continents itinerary in March. Very affordable because your cruise fare includes drinks, gratuities & some excursions. They even offered a Black Friday 2 for 1 deal last November and I was able to reprice my cruises to get the better price.

We cruised with Celestyal in 2017 when they still offered their Cuba itinerary. Nice international passenger mix, very good staff, food was good too! Ships are smaller & older but well taken care of - a more traditional cruise experience.

We are Elite on Princess & Diamond/Elite on RC/Celebrity & Black on MSC, but all of that is meaningless if they don't go where you want to go when you can go...

Welcome the Cruise Critic

Have you been on Celestyal's website? The itineraries are available with all the port times listed. We booked the cruises ourselves on-line. I can access both my reservations using my last name & booking number. I noticed on my reservation page they have added a pre-departure info booklet you can download as a pdf.

In Cyprus we will probably DIY with the hop on hop off bus. For Israel possibly a private tour to Jerusalem & Bethlehem.

Not a lot of current info available here on the ports of call board & this is a new itinerary for Celestyal. Hopefully there will be more info in December when the first cruisers return. No guarantee that any CC members will be on board. When we did the Cuba cruise with Celestyal the passenger mix was more European with some Canadian & American passengers. I don't remember getting much of a response on CC for a roll call for the Cuba cruise.

This is our second time on board the Crystal. First time was their 7 night Cuba cruise back in 2017. Really enjoyed the size of the ship. Anyone else booked?

Very excited for this itinerary & hoping to trade out some of the included excursions for the other choices. Some are the same as what is offered on the 4 nighter we're doing first.

Anyone else booked?

We are doing this one before the 7 night 3 Continents cruise on Celestyal Crystal March 21.

We have some hotels booked for arrival, in between & before flying home. Starting to look at tours for the days and ports that don't have an included tour.

Just back from 2 weeks in Japan - 8 night cruise plus extra time in Tokyo. 

We rented a pocket wifi device from a company found here on cc.

Cruise Port Navigation 

With exchange to CAD it was about $75 for 15 days with unlimited data. The device was delivered to our Yokohama hotel precruise. We used it in our Japan ports and post cruise in Tokyo. It came with a return envelope, so we were able to drop it in a mailbox at Narita before our flight home yesterday. 

Very easy to use & worked for both iphones.

Wifi is available in various locations, but if you are using apps to navigate the trains & subways plus other maps then the pocket wifi device is very convenient. Recommend using maps.me, Rome2rio & Tokyo Subway apps. 

Just disembarked Diamond.  There is a free bus shuttle to Sakuragicho station, but any other transportation looks like pre-arranged or taxi. 

We did the free shuttle & will be taking the train/ subway into Shinjuku to our airbnb apartment. 

There’s an app called Rome2rio that is working very nicely for train/subway/bus info. We also booked a pocket wifi device to use - works great with our iphones. 

We’re in Yokohama now. Staying tonight at the Hotel JAL. Basic double room for two was 9500 yen or about $113 CAD. Small, basic but it’s only one night!

We flew to Haneda Airport in Yokohama instead of Narita. The ticket counter for the bus was just outside the final customs/immigration stop. Bus tickets were 1440 yen about $18 CAD for 2. It was about a 25 minute drive to our stop which was Osenbashi Pier. Our hotel was a 10 minute walk away from the pier. Closer to Chinatown. Heading to Chinatown soon for dinner. We board Diamond Princess tomorrow. 

I received the offer this morning in an email. We have an inside for the Feb 14th sailing - booked long before the prices went up. Schedules don't work for us & I agree the offer isn't that exciting.

The 2 port day is to accommodate tours to the pyramids. Get off at the first & get back on at the second. We’re looking at one of the other excursions for that day that includes the pyramids & the Nile.

The menu was more international than greek, but it was quite good. We’re booking for March 2020 - just waiting for spring break dates to be confirmed. Yeah we’re stuck travelling during spring break due to me working in education.

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We did Cuba last year (March 2017) on Celestyal Crystal. Great cruise!! Good service & food. Our cruise fare included tips, excursions & drink package - really good value. Very international passenger mix - always someone interesting to talk to. All meals are open seating & no specialty restaurants.

We had an inside cabin - midship on deck 7. Great central location.

We're also looking at their Med 7 night itineraries for 2020.

maps.me

free and can be used offline once you download the maps you need

you can also bookmark locations

I've used it locally - Pacific Northwest, Las Vegas, Cuba & Europe

will be using it next year in Japan - already bookmarking important locations