ashlynn1021

Hi All! Made it back home last night and obviously pretty jet lagged, but overall the travel day was pretty smooth, went basically the same as the day going just in reverse, I will post all the details of that later so now going to post about disembarkation day. At about 7:15am we ate breakfast in Coastal Kitchen for one last time. No pictures because I am pretty sure you are bored of Coastal Kitchen at this point 🙃. We then walked across the pool deck and headed down to deck 5 to meet in Chops Grille for the 8am escorted disembarkation by the suite concierge. It was super easy, we met there, she gave us a sticker and a few minutes later at 8am she led us off and through scanning off the ship and escorted us through the terminal to the red tags section. Our cases were there waiting for us and we were on the curb with our luggage waiting for our transportation by 8:05am (unfortunately I set that at 9am but my parents were just ready to get off at that point and didn't want to wait until the 8:30am time to be escorted). Once on the curb, we sat with our luggage and waited, talking to everyone else who got off too early and also had transportation for 9am. It is probably good to point out that our cruise was essentially a closed loop for the EU, the only non-EU port was Turkey and there is some agreement there so there was no immigration so it was literally walk off, collect luggage, exit. There was no passport checks, facial recognition, etc. At about 8:45am our driver showed up with a sign with our name and we went up to him and helped us with our luggage walking to his van parked down the street (All the private drivers park in the same place at the port, and they all line up in the same row with their signs so it is pretty easy to find them). This was once again booked through Stefano's Rome Cabs. About an hour later we were dropped off at our hotel, the Hilton Rome Eur La Lama. This is a very new hotel, it just opened in 2023 and was even a brand new modern glass building. It is located near the convention center with some shops and restaurants but it is definitely not a tourist area, more on that later, but we chose to stay there because it was a shorter drive to the airport for the next morning. We tried to check in when we got there but unfortunately we were way to early for check in, as anyone who as ever had a post cruise hotel stay has experienced, so they stowed our bags for us so we could have taken the train into the more central part of Rome to see the sights but we were all tired after the exhausting 12 day cruise and felt like we got a good amount of central Rome in our 4 night pre cruise stay so we ended up just sitting in the hotel bar while we waited for rooms. They told us to check at the front desk at noon. At noon, we checked and they were able to assign us rooms, they were being cleaned so they would drop off the keys where we were sitting once they were done so we didn't have to wait in line again, 2 conferences were checking in at our hotel causing long lines at check in. Not even 5 minutes later, we got the keys. Here are some pictures of my room, my parents was identical a few doors down, just a mirror image: They were very new, modern, although still distinctly Italian (bidet, small, etc). The only issue we experienced was for some reason my parent's keys never worked. They tried like 4 times printing them new ones but there were some "IT issues" going on so my parents had to be let in their room all the time, thankfully it was only one night and also they were not the only people affected we found out later, seemed about 50/50 whether the keys worked, the front desk really couldn't answer why mine worked even. Other than that it was clean and convenient for the one night stay. Once we got our rooms, we asked the front desk for a restaurant nearby, unsurprisingly they did not recommend their own restaurant (our pre-cruise hotel was the same way), and recommended a restaurant in the art museum about a half mile away. The person at the front desk said it was super close, maybe 300 meters, but we have learned to take Italian distances with a grain of salt as they always underestimate. Anyways we went to a place called Tata: Not a lot of English was spoken there and it was the first restaurant we ate at in Rome that didn't have English menus so google translate to the rescue: We did have one mishap, they sent us the wrong pizza (the one underneath the one we ordered on the menu, leading to me accidentally eating anchovies in Rome, I guess I have a story to tell now 😂), but the waitress even had the right one on her notes so not sure how it happened, when we asked if it was correct, she right away acknowledged it was wrong and took it away and replaced it with the correct one, honestly no clue how it happened. Anyways here were the pizzas: (The wrong pizza, Naples, with anchovies, I didn't know if the pepperoni was under the cheese, it wasn't 🤣) (The second pizza we ordered that was never messed up, the Cappricciosa) (The replacement correct pizza, the Diavola aka Devil aka Pepperoni, with slices taken because we took before I could get a picture, thankfully the tour guide the day before in Sorrento told us that Pepperoni is bell pepper in Italy so if you want a pepperoni pizza, order a Diavola, although somehow we still managed to screw it up) Then we went and got gelato for one last time in Italy: The place we went to down the street from the hotel, La Romana, is a chain in Europe but it was amazing, the best gelato we had the entire trip, and only 4 euros for a large cone with up to 4 flavors, they also filled the cone with chocolate (White or Milk) and would top it with whipped cream if you wanted. I got mine filled with white chocolate, it was so good 😋. Thankfully someone here spoke English because all the signage was in Italian and we would have never figured it out otherwise, I was frantically using google translate until she came by and saved us. Also, just a general note on food prices, everything we had in Italy was very reasonable. Maybe it is just the places we normally eat at in Scottsdale are expensive but nothing was crazy expensive in Italy, my dad was drinking 6-7 euro a glass house wines and loving them (at home, he is a $20+ a glass guy, he never normally does house wines but in Italy they are much higher quality without all the preservatives), and for example, those pizzas were 11 euros and 12.50 euros a pizza, we have a neapolitan pizza place in Scottsdale that it over $20 a pizza of the same size and quality. And it was about the same everywhere we ate in Rome. Anyways, after the gelato, we headed back to the hotel for an early night since we were getting picked up at 4am the next day to go to the airport. I will post about the travel day at a later time, and also wrap up cabin reviews, overall ship pictures and reviews, etc. I am actually flying to Miami on Friday for a wedding next weekend so this week promises to be hectic, on top of going back to work. Thanks again and TTYL! - Ashley

That was actually a picture of Fira and my dad got it from Coastal Kitchen that night, he did better than me with that one, mine all had contrast issues 🙃, it was beautiful dining in there during sunset. You would have the same view from the Windjammer as well. As we were sailing away, we pulled up closer as they were bringing the last tenders and supplies on board during sunset and that is when we got that amazing view, sunset is quite late there, it didn't really get dark until after 8pm (remember I live in AZ with no DST since we don't want the sun this time of year so this was very jarring for us), so not sure you would be able to be in Santorini for sunset anyways. Long story short, yeah I would try to go back mid afternoon probably, we were advised to definitely get in line before 6pm but we heard the line started growing shortly after 1pm.

Hi All! Shortly after I posted that yesterday, we got lucky and we got hotel rooms! Anyways, back to posting about day 12, the last day of the cruise, we were docked in Naples and had a shore excursion called "Sorrento with Pizza and Gelato". We started our day in Coastal Kitchen for breakfast, no pictures this time since you get the point 🙃. Then we headed to the theater to meet for our tour. Shortly after getting on our tour bus we passed Mt Vesuvius: Also our tour guide, Rita, introduced herself: We had a long drive to Sorrento, close to 2 hours in the morning traffic, so Rita narrated talking about the history of the area and things as we passed, and we also went around the bus and everyone shared where they were from. Rita was probably the highlight of the tour, she was a great guide! Once we got to Sorrento, we went to an inlaid wood store, this definitely felt like another place giving kickbacks to the tour company but everything was very pretty. They gave us a demonstration of how it was made: I knew immediately the lady doing the demonstration was not from Italy, no Italian accent, definitely a New York accent, so I asked her after, she was from Brooklyn not far from where my mom was born! Small world! Anyways, then we had about an hour free time to shop. I bought some magnets as per usual. And then we met up again for lunch: (A very sad salad) (Included white wine for everyone) (Pizza! Although I don't think I need to caption that haha) (migliaccio, a dessert made with Ricotta and Lemon, it was very good) (The restaurant the meal was at) Then we walked a bit to the Gelato shop and had Gelato: And then it was back to the bus for a drive to the limoncello factory. This was not listed in our tour description (like the inlaid wood store), and definitely gave kick backs to the tour company. It felt like the tequila factories you always end up at on excursions in Mexico, some of the many reasons we normally don't do excursions on Caribbean cruises. Anyways, here are some pictures from the factory: Beautiful view of the Sorrento coastline from the terrace of the factory: Then we boarded the bus one last time to head back to Naples, it took about an hour without traffic. Our final towel animals: (Not really an animal but a flower!) Then we finished packing and headed to dinner in Coastal Kitchen for one last time: (Same menu as Day 5 so I didn't take any food pictures) Then we said our good byes to the host Jose: And put our luggage out in the hallway: Once again, don't judge the amount of luggage 🤣. Always a sad sight seeing the hallway the last day. Anyways, now I am caught up through the end of the cruise! I will probably post about our post cruise hotel stay when I get home, unless I get really bored during our layover in Heathrow later. And then of course I still have cabin photos/reviews and ship photos that I will post when I get home. Thanks again and TTYL! - Ashley

Hi All! Sadly (because it means the cruise is over) made it off the ship and we are waiting for a hotel room in the lobby of our post cruise hotel. Yesterday got very busy between the long tour in Sorrento and packing so I never got to posting about the sea day, day 11. So finally going to catch up on that now. We started our day once again in Coastal Kitchen for breakfast: Then we ended up in the Suite Lounge while we waited for our rooms to be done so here is what breakfast looked like in there: Then we made it back into our rooms where this sad sight was on the beds: It is always so weird when the last day of a cruise is a port day so they have to start all of this early. Then we headed to Captain's Corner: I also made a point to walk around the pool deck after Captain's corner since someone asked how busy it was on a sea day. Unfortunately, the weather wasn't great that day, it was a bit drizzly that day and quite cloudy so the main pool was fairly empty but the covered areas outside the Solarium as well as the solarium were completely packed. I think this is a pretty good indicator that the pool deck would be full on sea days if we had better weather that day. I took pictures of the crowd that day that I might share when I share some pictures I took around the ship later on. Then we had Izumi for lunch: Then we headed back to the rooms again to pack some things since we knew the last day we had a long tour. I re-organized my towel animals in a little zoo on the dresser: Then we had dinner in Chops Grille: They had dancing with the stripes that night in 270 as well so we watched a bit of that before heading to bed for our early tour to Sorrento from Naples the last day. Ok now back to sitting in the hotel lobby waiting for a room. Don't be shocked if you see another post about Naples/Sorrento while I am still waiting here 🤣. Thanks and TTYL! - Ashley

Hi All! Back again, now to recap Day 10 in Athen (Piraeus), Greece! So this was the day I went alone on a very long tour in Athens. The tour I ended up on after lots of back and forth was "Acropolis Sightseeing, New Acropolis Museum with Plaka Free Time". It had literally the earliest meeting time of all the tours in that port of 7am in the theater on deck 4. Cafe 270 opens at 6:30am so I was literally the first person in there that morning grabbing a bagel and filling my water bottle (of course using glasses of water to do it). I then headed to the theater to get my number and wait for the announcement that we were cleared to go ashore. Literally as Captain Per was announcing the ships clearance, they came over to my tour's section and told us to head down ashore. From there, we got on the bus and got one of my least favorite things on tours: radios. They just hurt your ears, especially after a 7+ hour tour. Anyways here is what those joys look like, I would later find out they were 70 euros if we lost them, I didn't lose mine but you will find out later why I know this: Then we drove away from Piraeus as we headed to Athens. I snapped a few photos as we were driving through there and our guide, Eva, started commentating: It was a cloudy day but thankfully had no rain in the forecast and the clouds kept the temperatures down in a comfortable range. Our first stop was the Acropolis. Here was our first view of the Parthenon as we reached the site: Our tour guide, Eva, led us through the site with her red umbrella, commentating a lot, so much so that it was fairly empty when we got there but fairly full when we finally made it up to the Parthenon. The only good thing about that is it allowed for lots of breaks from the steps. Here she was: And here are some photos I took of the ruins during the walk up: When we made it up, she stopped just beyond the Parthenon to walk us through even more of the history including many pictures, here is a sample of just one: After our extremely thorough history lesson, we finally got a little time to explore on our own. I snapped a selfie to prove I made it to the top and then headed back down with the guide as I was alone and didn't want to get lost: The steps themselves weren't bad, there were only a couple really high ones, the worst part was that many of them were marble and it had rained the day before so on top of marble being slippery by itself, it was extra slippery with the little dampness that was still there. Anyways, from the Acropolis, we had about a 10 minute walk to the new Acropolis museum: Outside the museum was a spot where you could see the exposed ruins that they found under the site: Once inside, we had a bit of a wait (probably close to 40 minutes, although many of us spent some of that time waiting in the line for the toilets) while our guide bought our tickets and then we proceeded through the museum. We had the choice to go through it alone or with the guide, if you went alone, she told us to meet outside the entrance at noon. I opted to stay with her as she explained everything since once again, I was alone and I didn't want to get lost. You will notice that theme in my day. Our guide commentated for us throughout the whole museum. Those of us who stayed with her got an extremely thorough history lesson that we didn't know we needed 🙃. I said my dad would have loved this tour so it was extremely ironic I ended up on it alone, although he didn't want to see the Acropolis since he saw it 28 years ago when I was just shy of 3 on the Pacific Princess. After doing it, I can't help but agree that once is enough, Anyways, here are some photos I snapped in the museum, a lot of the artifacts are replicas since the British have many of the originals but there were still many original pieces: (Some samples of what the tools used to make everything at the acropolis probably looked like, although we don't know since no tools were found in the ruins) We finally made it through the museum with the guide at close to 12:30. Remember how she said to meet at noon? Anyways, from there we walked back to our bus and had a city tour from the comfort of our bus. We saw the modern olympic stadium and other sites and took photos from the bus. I got very lucky that I was sitting on the right side as pretty much everything she pointed out was on the right side. Here are some photos I snapped during this portion: From there, we headed to a square where we got the included snack on our tour. The tour description said souvlaki but we actually got gyros and a bottle of water. We ate these at a square, we weren't allowed to sit at the tables at the restaurant. I forgot to snap a photo of the gyro but I didn't eat much of it. After that, we headed to the Plaka. At this time, we were already at the time our tour was supposed to be back on the ship so we ended up having less free time, only 30 minutes. Note the wait we had for tickets in the museum as well as how long we took going through the museum. Our guide blamed the traffic but I can't help but think it wasn't just the traffic. We stopped on a square with the Metropolitan Church of the Annunciation to the Virgin Mary and there was a large souvenir shop on the same square. Here is a photo of the church, you will notice women with roses in it, we were strongly told not to take their "free" roses (just a note: this was the only port where I felt slightly uncomfortable about the possibility of pickpocket's, I was happily carrying my locking travelon that day, and our guide consistently reminded us to watch our bags): From there I headed to the souvenir shop to get my magnets (I have a magnet board in my laundry room so I get magnets from each port to put on there). Our guide was very much so "hyping" this store but I will acknowledge these were the cheapest magnets I got in Greece, they were less than 2 euros each, so while every tour went to this store and the tour operators clearly got a kick back, I didn't necessarily mind. We also got free samples of baklava there which were a great treat. Finally, now approaching an hour late, we met up to join our bus to drive back to Piraeus and join the ship. Thankfully all aboard wasn't for a few hours so that wasn't a concern, just how long the tour was running. Our guide then started to count us and continually came up 2 short. We waited 15 minutes in the square and then headed back to the bus, she counted again, and we were still 2 short. After everyone accounted for their neighbors, we figured out who was missing and they had apparently already tipped our guide, they just didn't give back their radios or tell her they were leaving. This is when I found out how much those radios cost 🤦‍♀️. I think that couple probably got fed up with the history lessons but they should have at least said they were leaving because we waited another 30 minutes on the bus before leaving. Our crew member escort even walked around with the paddle trying to find them. We finally gave up and headed back to the ship more than an hour behind schedule. The combination of this and the delays in the museum, and the supposed traffic, all led to us getting back to the ship close to 4, we were supposed to be back originally at 2:15. As sail away approached, no names were called so I am going to assume those 2 made it back on the ship. Anyways, I dropped off my stuff in the cabin and saw my towel animal: And since it was close to 4, and I hadn't eaten much all day (I had excited myself for the souvlaki and really didn't eat the gyro when that is what we got instead), I ate at playmaker's when they opened at 4. I didn't get a menu and just ordered right away when I sat down since I know that menu nearly by heart. Here are my standard chicken tenders order: Then I napped basically until our 8pm dinner in Giovanni's. I was exhausted and it was a really long day. Dinner photos: (we didn't order these ^, our waiter didn't think we order enough 😂 but we definitely did, we were completely stuffed after this meal) And then it was time for the pub, even though I was tired from 2 early days in a row and the extremely long day in Athens, we were gaining back the hour we lost earlier in the cruise that night and the next day (today) was a sea day, which meant I could sleep in. The stowaway crashed the pub and it was a hoot: Ok now for my overall assessment of the tour and my day in Athens: I am very glad I did it once (I was 3 last time so I didn't do it obviously) but I don't need to do it ever again. Unlike Mykonos and Santorini that I would gladly see again, this did not join the list. I can see why my dad bailed on me and obviously my mom could not do this tour. Speaking of this tour, it was listed as strenuous and that was definitely correct. It had significant walking plus all the steps and climbing at the Acropolis (on slippery marble). And our tour guide, Eva, she was definitely interesting. She has been doing this for 40 years. She spoke great English but probably spoke way too much although I know a few people on the tour very much so enjoyed it, but many did not. I felt bad for our crew escort as she continuously called her the wrong name the whole day. I do know the other groups that left the ship after us on this same tour made it back earlier so take with that what you will. Overall, this is probably a doable port with a private excursion but not sure you will get far completely on your own since Piraeus is a bit of distance from Athens. I also enjoyed having a guide in the Acropolis and the museum so that would also justify at least a private tour, although of course the assurance of the ship waiting for you in the event of traffic or something was worth it for me especially being alone that day. Today we were at sea, we also started packing as tomorrow, our last day, day 12, is a port day in Naples. We have a shore excursion called "Sorrento with Pizza and Gelato" tomorrow and I am sure that promises to be a good time but I will definitely report back. I am now a day behind again so some of this might get caught up on when I get home but I will see how I do the next couple days. I will try to post about our sea day that we had today tomorrow sometime but this next day will be busy. Thanks again and TTYL! - Ashley

He was fantastic! We have done Teppanyaki a couple times and we really enjoyed him! He also was great with the kids at our table. - Ashley

Hi All! Back on the morning of Day 11 (a sea day) to finally talk about Day 9: Santorini Day! Sorry for the delay, had 2 early mornings and long days in a row. On day 9, we had a tour meeting time of 7:25am in the theater so we each did what we needed for breakfast to be good for the day, I went to 270 and grabbed a bagel. And then it was off to the theater to wait for ships clearance. Once we got ships clearance, they started calling numbers for shore excursion only tenders to Athinios and we boarded I believe the second tender over to the shore excursion port: (Norwegian Epic that was not scheduled to be there as seen from our tender) (Marella Explorer, the former Celebrity Galaxy, as seen from our tender, we do have a story from her, our cabin got flooded! I guess that could be told another time haha) Once we made it to Athinios, we boarded our bus for our shore excursion, "Pyrgos Village with Mezes and Wine". Then we had the very interesting switchback roads up the island: (View from our bus ride) On the way to our first stop, we saw the first grape vines we would see on the island. It is very interesting how they grow them in Santorini since they grow them flat: Then we had a photo stop on the highest point of the island: Then we headed to Pyrgos village where we spent a little more than an hour. We had the option there to climb to the top to see the church with our guide or stay in the lower part of the town. We all opted to stay in the lower part, grab a coffee, and relax a bit. My mom could not have done the climb and when I saw the first part of the cobblestone stairs, I decided not to go since I knew what lied ahead for me the next day in Athens. Some photos I got there: (The church part of our group climbed up to) Then we headed off to the Venetsanos winery for our wine tasting and snacks. As we pulled in, we could see the Regent Ship, the Seven Seas Voyager, sailing in from the distance: We then had a short wait for another tour before we were seated for our wine tasting and snacks: (We tasted a dry white wine, a dry red wine, and a sweet dessert red wine) By the end of the tasting, the Regent ship had made it into position for tendering: A picture of us at the winery: Then we drove to Fira, our final stop on the tour! From there, our guide, he told us at the beginning to call him "F" (he said it would be easy to remember, think of the American curse word, 🤣), he told us his actual Greek name but it was very difficult to pronounce, anyways, he led us from the bus stop uphill to the pedestrian zone in Fira. There really was nothing in this port that was flat, so it was a good thing we made sure my mom was well rested. (Oh yeah, we were number 12 for the 3rd time on this cruise 😂) Once in the pedestrian zone, he explained the cable car system, showed us where to get the cable cars and gave us our cable car vouchers. From there, the tour was effectively over and we were free to explore Fira on our own. It was shortly after noon at this point, we had about a 20 minute walk to the cable cars, and we heard the line for the cable cars would start to grow significantly at 1pm (especially given the additional ship in port, more reason to dislike the ugly NCL Epic 🙃 ) so we opted to go straight there, albeit with a few quick stops inside various stores along the way. Sign with a map of the island at the cable car station: We waited in line about 30 minutes for the cable cars. Views from the cable cars once we finally got on them: (I ended up in a separate car from my parents so they snapped this picture) (The cable car station at the bottom in Skala, the old port) We made it back to the ship at about 1:30 so no surprise at this point, we headed to Coastal Kitchen for lunch: Then we once again had Siesta time before dinner in once again, Coastal Kitchen: (Same menu as night 1 and we all got the same appetizers and entrees so no need to post anything new there) (I did get a picture of the dessert menu this time, and we did get some different desserts) View of the sunset in Santorini from Coastal Kitchen with Fira all lit up: Overall, Santorini was beautiful. It is definitely not an island for someone will any mobility issues, there are steps everywhere to get on and off the cable car, in town, etc. My parents are both very glad they saw it when they did. We did hear from some people who chose to walk up that the stairs up are completely covered in Donkey poo making them even more slippery so just a heads up if you decide to make that climb. We also heard someone on the Epic fell on the steps and broke their ankle that day so also be aware. They were rushing down to meet their all aboard since theirs was earlier and a crew member we are friends with on here said they helped them call for help and they were likely not making their ship at that point. Anyways, my mom said she got her "Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants" moment but admitted that Mykonos was also just as beautiful and a little more accessible (still not devoid of stairs in the winding streets in town but didn't have the cliff aspect). She is very glad she made it as this was on her bucket list. The only regret is we didn't pick a tour that went to Oia to see the windmills but I heard it was very crowded there that day and Pyrgos was pretty quiet so that might have been a good thing. Also, just the logistics of a shore excursion in Santorini do make this port a lot easier as you get to take a bus ride up and you don't have to line up very early for tender tickets (although all the shore excursions met pretty early so it might be a wash there). I would probably recommend a shore excursion for anyone's first time in Santorini because of the logistics of everything. Anyways, there is (finally) my discussion on Santorini. The next day, yesterday now, was Day 10 and we were docked in Piraeus (Athens), Greece. My parents made the decision a couple days ago that they no longer wanted to do Athens, they needed a break from shore excursions. We were booked on a panoramic tour, "Ancient Athens, Plaka, and Shopping", and when we went to cancel them, the suite concierge talked me into changing my tour as well if I was going to go alone as I wouldn't get much our of the panoramic tour. This was the tour we changed a few weeks before the cruise after my mom's fall and we originally had "Acropolis, Plaka and Lunch at the Famous Bairaktaris Tavern" so I went to book that one again and found out it had significantly increased on price on board, it as now over $300 a person and we had it booked for well less than $200 a person so me being me (and being a bit cheap), I booked a similar tour that didn't have the sit down lunch and was much less money, it was also 2 hours longer as it included the museum for a total of 7 hours and 15 minutes scheduled. All that to say, I ended up on "Acropolis Sightseeing, New Acropolis Museum with Plaka Free Time" that had a meeting time yesterday of 7am, it was literally the earliest meeting time of all the tours in Athens 😳. Anyways, that is why this got delayed. Hopefully I will get to posting about Athens later today since it is a see day. Now off to get ready for a relaxing sea day today! Thanks and TTYL! - Ashley

Hey Guys! Back from a beautiful day in Santorini today, I am going to post about it tomorrow though, we had a change of plans in Athens tomorrow that involves me being alone on a tour at 7am tomorrow 😳 so I need to get to bed, I will post more about that tomorrow when I update about Santorini. Thanks and TTYL! - Ashley

Hey All! Back from a wonderful Day 8 in Rhodes, Greece! We once again started our day in Coastal Kitchen for breakfast: Then, we headed off the ship in Rhodes for some independent exploration of the old town: We bought some oil paintings as well (I think I mentioned in a previous post that I just bought my second house last year so I thought these would be pretty on my still bare walls and would help me remember this trip): Then we once again got gelato (gelato and coastal kitchen, our 2 constants): Then we headed back to the ship a bit early, this cruise has been tiring for both of my parents. Today's Towel Animal: View of Rhodes from the ship: Then I wandered around the fairly empty ship to take pictures, I will go through those and post them after the cruise (when I do the cabin reviews as well), but here is a sneak peak of those in the form of today's towel station towel animal: Then we had an earlier dinner in Teppanyaki: (Our Chef, Kevin) (Olaf made with eggs 🤣) (That bottom sauce is yum yum sauce, the best 😋) (Beautiful view as we sailed away 🤩) Teppanyaki was absolutely delicious but it was definitely a lot of food. It was a nice change up from the typical restaurants and the show aspect of the meal is a lot of fun. We did have a family with 4 kids at our table but honestly the second the show started, they were so entertained, they quieted down. We did kinda expect kids since we did eat a lot earlier tonight due to our early tour tomorrow. Anyways, I would obviously come back to Teppanyaki/Hibachi on other ships since I have done it multiple times now and I definitely recommend it to others. Speaking of tomorrow, we are in Santorini! This is probably the highlight of this itinerary and I think the cruise line knows it as we have the longest port stay there. We are doing "Pyrgos Village with Mezes and Wine" obviously booked through shore excursions tomorrow. Given the tender situation, we have heard an excursion is the best deal here and also it means we don't have to do the cable car both ways. We are in Santorini tomorrow with 2 other ships, the Marella Explorer (former Celebrity Galaxy that we have actually been on!) and the Regent Seven Seas Voyager, so the wait for the cable car down shouldn't be terrible but I am sure I will find out and share. Thanks and TTYL! - Ashley

Hi All! Back to recap day 7 in Limassol, Cyprus. We once again started our day with breakfast in Coastal Kitchen, I didn't snap any pictures this time, I am sure you get the idea at this point. Then, our tour started a little later so we headed to our cabins to get ready to go ashore and then headed to the theater for our tour. As I said yesterday, our tour was "Panoramic Limassol & Shopping Tour". When we got to the theater, they gave us our stickers and then told us to come back at 11 as we were too early, so we decided to get Starbucks and then headed back at 5 til 11. At that time, they told us "oh your number was called a while ago". That was the first sign that this was not going to be a good tour. We were not the only people on our tour that this happened to so we all headed off the ship to the buses where we were the last parties to our bus. Then we started out tour with the panoramic drive around Cyprus. It was fine but our guide was so monotoned, I think my mom fell asleep. He had difficulty with English and was pausing before each and every word. None of our tour guides this trip have spoken English as their first language (obviously given where we are) but this one was by far the worst, he was trying but it was not great. I didn't catch his name either although that might have been a good thing. As we headed out on the bus, I discovered they drive on the left side of the road here. We passed the ship so I snapped a photo there: And then we had a few photo stops at various locations, honestly I could not tell you what any of them were but here they are: Then was the highlight of the tour, they dropped us off in town for an hour for food and shopping. We got gelato again: Then once back at the terminal, we waited in a very long line to get back on the ship as security here was controlled by the port. Here is a picture of the terminal with Limassol in the background, it kinda reminded me of the NCL terminal in Miami in shape, although obviously not size, I do think cruises can start and end here: Then I got a very late lunch at el loco fresh: At that time it was nearly time for dinner. We did our usual rest and then prep for dinner routine. Before dinner, we went to Giovanni's wine bar again and while there we saw the Stowaway piano player again: And then it was time for dinner in Chops Grille: (Sorry some bread was already missing in this photo 😂 ) And then we had our usual evening hang out in the pub: Now to recap a bit on the tour... yesterday, the ship announced they would offer a shuttle to town in Limassol. We should have cancelled our excursion and did that instead. Yes, we did see more of Cyprus this way, but we didn't get much out of it. We should have just gone in town for lunch and shopping and the hour stop in town was really not long enough to sit down anywhere and eat. Of course, they waited until the last minute to announce and sell shuttle tickets so no one would cancel their excursions. Anyways, I guess you live and you learn. Tomorrow, we are in Rhodes, Greece. Speaking of cancelling excursions, we cancelled our walking tour here. We found of the town is near the port and opted to cancel it to give my mom a break so she can hopefully be 100% for Santorini the next day which is going to be an early morning. We also have Teppanyaki for dinner tomorrow. Thanks and TTYL! - Ashley

Hey All! Back from a nice day in Limassol where we are currently still docked. My dad finally wrote something about his Ephesus tour on Day 5 so here is that. He put a ton of photos in it (like twice the amount I have been doing) and I don't know what can be cut so attaching it all as a PDF here, also the forums don't like copy pasting from word docs I have discovered from a formatting perspective. Anyways, see the attached document! Thanks and TTYL! - Ashley EphesusTour.pdf

Hi All! Once again I am back to recap day 6, an actual sea day, aka the day with all the crown and anchor things 🙃. We started our day off with breakfast in Coastal Kitchen... again... I am sorry, we are boring. Anyways, today I managed to get a photo of our tray of pastries before we attacked it so here it is: \ After breakfast, our normal stateroom attendant, Linton, was back and he had done my room and had one of the cuter towel animals I have seen: Next up (after my parents may or may not have booked another cruise...) we had the Pinnacle Cheers with an Officer Lunch. It was in the dining room on deck 4 and on the other side of the same floor was the Diamond Plus lunch. Anyways, here are a few photos I captured there: After that, we headed to the backstage tour. At least on Odyssey, the actual backstage tours and not just the panels are back, although it still started with a panel Q&A before we headed back stage where we were not allowed to take pictures. Here is a picture of the panel: Then I came back to my room where the chef's choice amenity had been delivered. I know these vary ship to ship and even sailing to sailing but here is what I got this time: I then wandered around the ship a bit. It was quite busy since it was a see day, I will try to capture some ship photos on a port day or in the morning one day when it is emptier. Anyways, after that, I got some Sorrento's pizza... for science 🤣: Then once again it was time to rest and get ready for dinner (not that the rest was really necessary on this incredibly lazy sea day). Once again, we had dinner in Coastal Kitchen: After dinner, we once again spent a bit of time in the pub before heading to bed: Tomorrow we are in Limassol, Cyprus. On boarding day we found out our mall transfer here had been cancelled so we booked "Panoramic Limassol & Shopping Tour" so we will be doing that tomorrow. We also have Chops Grille booked for dinner tomorrow so I promise you will finally see less Coastal Kitchen 😂. Thanks again and TTYL! - Ashley

Hi All, Back to recap a rather uneventful day 5 here on Odyssey of the Seas. Today, we were docked in Kusadasi, Turkey. This morning, all 3 of us went to breakfast together in Coastal Kitchen before my dad left for his Ephesus excursion: (I took photos of breakfast this morning since we got some more exciting options and I knew there wouldn't be a ton to talk about today 🤣) Then my dad headed off in Kusadasi for his Ephesus small group tour, I found out it was in fact actually 20 people and not 40 so it really was a smaller group. I will have to make him write something about it because I don't know what all he did, and I did make him take pictures. Maybe you all could encourage him to share his thoughts! Then my mom and I lounged in the Solarium, she read her kindle while I wrote my hotel review earlier 🙃. Here were some fun towel animals at the towel stand: Next up, we went back to our rooms to towel animals in the rooms, today our rooms had 2 different ones instead of the same like other days so I have pictures of both (our normal stateroom attendant Linton had some dental work done in Turkey today so he had the day off and someone else filled in for him, hence the different towel animals, who knew this would be the highlight of my day 😂 ) : Then my mom and I had a quiet lunch together in Coastal Kitchen. The menu was a repeat of the first day but I remembered to get a picture this time and we both ordered the exact same things: Then it was siesta time and my dad came back from his tour. We once again had dinner in coastal kitchen, I promise you will see this changed up in the next couple days: And then tonight we changed it up and hung out in the schooner bar. The pub guitarist had the night off and there was karaoke going on in the pub. My parents refuse to listen to karaoke and I don't blame them 😆: Tomorrow is an actual day at sea finally! We have the pinnacle luncheon tomorrow so you will see a little less coastal kitchen from us. There is also the backstage tour in the afternoon if I am up for it. One fun fact we found out about the pinnacles on board this sailing: of the 89 pinnacles, only 14 joined for this sailing, the rest were on the TA. That means excluding us there are only 11 others who weren't on B2B, we have yet to find any of them 🤷‍♀️. Thanks again and TTYL! - Ashley

Hey All! Back on Day 5 from Kusadasi, Turkey, aka a pseudo sea day for my mom and I. I am sitting in the solarium and decided it was finally time to post that hotel review. For our 4 nights, 3 days pre cruise in Rome we stayed in the Doubletree by Hilton Rome Monti. We were in a family connecting superior room which was a King Deluxe room and a King Superior room connected to each other through a little vestibule. It kinda reminded me of the old family connecting junior suites on the original Quantum class ships and the new connecting rooms on Icon. We had one door to get into both of our rooms (303 and 305): The other side of that door: And then a little hallway with the separate doors for 303 and 305: 305 in the front was the larger King Superior room that my parents stayed in and 303 to the right was the smaller King Deluxe room that I stayed in. The hotel also had the same configuration where the King Superior room was replaced with a Twin Superior room which would probably be ideal if you have young kids, obviously our setup was better for us. When you entered my room, 303, on the right was some storage for clothing and a little table: On the left was the bathroom: Mine had a bit of an awkward toilet setup with the toilet and bidet behind the door, and the shower definitely flooded the bathroom every morning although my parents room had the same shower issue. Given the standard for hotels in Rome was tiny rooms and tiny bathrooms, this really wasn't that bad and more than sufficed. As you got further in the room, my bed was on the left: View from the bed: The full king sized bed was a bit tight around it but overall really not a bad amount of room for a hotel in Rome. Also pretty adequate outlets throughout the room. Next up was my parent's room, 305. Their room had a hallway when you entered that headed to the bathroom up ahead with a pocket door (remedying the toilet issues my room had) and the bedroom to the right. Don't judge the amount of luggage in the hallway 🤣, my mom will tell you she likes to have options although I am pretty sure that my dad packed the most by weight of all of us: Here was their bathroom (Same shower as mine, just a bigger bathroom counter and slightly different layout): If you turn right in front of their bathroom, here is the entry to the bedroom: Immediately to the left in their bedroom was a similar storage system to my room and a similar table: In front of their bed was a little sofa that pulled out to a twin bed, I joked I could have shared a room with them (not that I wanted to) but it would have been awfully tight with this pulled out: And here was there King bed, they had a little more room on each side of theirs than I did: Overall, given the typical hotels you see in Rome, this was fairly modern, well located, never much more than a mile from where we wanted to go, and had loads of restaurants around it in addition to the restaurant in the hotel. Here were the restaurants someone at the front desk recommended to us all very near the hotel, we went to the second one, the pizza place, twice: There was also a gelato place down the street and a wine store around the corner where my dad got his wine that he took on board. The wine store had some open bottles so he was able to get an idea of what he was buying and the lady that worked there was incredibly helpful. He also didn't get talked into anything ridiculously priced, the 3 bottles he bought were about 20 euros each. He spends more than the price of all 3 combined (plus vat) pretty often on one bottle at home. We also got included hotel breakfast for being Hilton gold members but the coffee situation wasn't ideal as I stated in an earlier blog so we ended up getting coffee and pastries at a cafe down the street each morning instead. Overall, this hotel worked out really well for us. I am sure there are better located hotels that are less modern but this was really not that far from anything and gave us what we want and even pleased my picky mom with a modern hotel and a nice lobby. The furthest drive we had was to the Vatican but obviously we only went there once so it wasn't a big deal. Anyways, if anyone else is looking for a hotel in Rome, I would definitely recommend this one. Now just a quick update on our post cruise hotel situation, while we were spending 6 hours in the Heathrow lounge on our travel day, I discovered that the opening date for the Cardo Roma Autograph Collection (owned by Marriott) was further delayed from 5/1 to 5/13 and we are staying there 5/17 so I made the executive decision to book the Hilton Rome Eur La Lama instead. I then spent the next day moving around our post cruise transportation. Once everything was finalized, I cancelled the Cardo Roma. I didn't want to risk finding out it hadn't opened once we got on the ship so I think I made the right choice. The next day we tried to re-book the hotel in my dad's name and it was already sold out except for suites so I am glad I grabbed it when I did in Heathrow. The Hilton opened in 2023 and is in roughly the same location as the Cardo Roma, about halfway between the FCO airport and the center of Rome. Since we have an early flight the next day, aside from staying in an airport hotel (and both options there were older, which didn't meet my mom's requirements), this was the best solution. Ok, now back to lounging in the solarium! Feel free to let me know if you have any questions about the Doubletree, I will do my best to answer them! Thanks and TTYL! - Ashley

We really weren't given a warning, my dad said there was something mentioned his tour description but nothing on today's compass that I can find.

Hi All! Back to recap today, day 4, in Mykonos. Mykonos has officially entered my list of ports I would love to go back and spend time in outside of a cruise so that means this was definitely a good day. Today we did the Mykonos Exploration with Farmhouse Wine Tastings shore excursion. It had a meeting time of 8:20am in the theater and since Coastal Kitchen adjusted its breakfast hours for how early we were in port today, we once again had breakfast in Coastal Kitchen. I didn't take any pictures this time since I think you get the point, the breakfast menu obviously stays the same. After that, we headed to the theater once again where once again we ended up being in group 12, the same number as yesterday, no clue how that happened but it did. When our number was called, we headed off the ship and met our guide Xena. From there we got on the bus and headed to our first stop, the early morning wine tasting (there was a later time for this tour but in the time we debated what to do here, it filled up, this was one of the ports added when Israel was cancelled). Also of note, we were docked in the new port today, this was originally scheduled as a tender port but I guess they were able to take the one spot in the dock, an MSC ship was out there tendering. We then got to a small farm where we tasted 3 local wines: a white, a rose, and a red. They also had some cheese and bread to nosh on along with the wine. The owner of the winery explained each wine to us before we tasted and gave us a little history of wine in Greece. After the wine tasting, we drove into town where we found out that we would be taking the sea bus back to the new port after the walking portion of the tour in town and we could return at our leisure. Our guide handed out sea bus tickets and instructed us to each hold our own... but they would only be 2 euros if we lost them 🤣. \ After that we got off and walked for the old tender port to town. On the way, our guide made sure to stop at a map to give us our bearings. From there, we headed in town where we saw all the picturesque white buildings, churches, and windmills: (MSC ship anchored, on the right in the distance you can see Odyssey docked) After the walking tour of the town, our guide showed us where the sea bus would pick up at and told us we could either go back with her or stay in town. We opted to stay in town and do some shopping and grab some lunch before heading back to the ship: We then lined up for the sea bus and headed back to the ship: (Sea bus) (Today's towel animal) Then once again, we had our usual siesta time before getting ready for dinner, once again in Coastal Kitchen: We then of course had to say goodbye to Mihai since he is getting off tomorrow in Ephesus: And after dinner we once again spent some time in the pub: Overall, we really enjoyed Mykonos. Once again, you could buy the sea bus tickets without being on an excursion so if I were coming on a cruise here again, I would probably just take that into town and spend the day in town, although I did enjoy the overview of the history and everything for my first time here. Although it was definitely a bit early for the wine tasting 😂. Regardless, I think we all fell in love with Mykonos. My parents have a neighbor with a house here and my dad already texted her asking when we could stay in her house here 😆. Tomorrow in Ephesus my dad is getting off for a tour alone. We couldn't convince my mom to get off (She has heard bad things about Turkey they we couldn't get our of her head, combined with everything going on for her we didn't think the ruins were a great idea), so I am going to stay on the ship as well to be with her. I might try to convince my dad to write a guest post or something since my mom and my day will probably involve more Coastal Kitchen, and wondering around the ship 🙃. Anyways, thanks again and TTYL - Ashley

Hi All! Just got back from Mykonos but first I am going to recap yesterday, Day 3, in Chania. We started our day in Coastal Kitchen again for breakfast, I know we are boring and predictable: Then we headed to the theater to meet for our excursion, Chania Old Town Walk: Once our group was called, we headed to our bus where we met our tour guide Nicole: From there, we headed to a photo stop at Venizelos Graves where you could see all of the old town from above: Next up was a short bus ride to just outside of old town. From there, we started the walking portion of our tour: After that, our guide gave us some free time in old town. We got some gelato during our free time: After the free time, we had the choice to stay in old town and take the shuttle back or take the bus back with the tour. We opted to take the bus back with the tour: Once we got back to our ship, we ate in 270 cafe for lunch: And then had our normal siesta time before dinner. Dinner was at Giovanni's: (apologies that I didn't get a photo of the calamari before my dad attacked it) After dinner, we ran into the stowaway piano, he is no Guido who was on here in December but I believe Guido is on Icon so we will have to make do 🤣: And then it was time again for the pub: All in all, it was a good day, nothing too thrilling and probably a port that we could just take the shuttle to old town if we came in the future but it was interesting hearing some of the history of Chania and was good for our first time there. The cruise line shore excursions are very rarely something to write home about but they work and make my mom more comfortable, especially when we have a crew member escort which we did this time. Thanks again and TTYL! - Ashley :

Hey All! Back to recap Day 2 onboard the cruise. First Towel Animal: Sailing through the Strait of Messina: Norwegian Epic Docked in Messina Today: It was a sea day so we spent the day relaxing for the most part and at all 3 meals in coastal kitchen and pre dinner drinks in Giovanni's wine bar again. Here at the pictures from that: Breakfast: Lunch: Dinner: We also went to top tier in the morning, there were quite a few 1050 milestones and one 1400 milestone. Here are some pictures I took there, not posting the milestones pictures for privacy but if anyone was one of them and wants a picture of their slide I got all of them. Here are what I can share: We wrapped up the night in the pub with Vishal, a bartender we first met on Symphony before covid and we are glad is in a bar we actually go to this sailing (he was in windjammer in December and as I stated earlier, we basically never walk in there 🤣). Mark James, the guitar player, played this night and so far so good although I know this is a more difficult crowd with these port intensive sailings. Anyways, here are some pictures from those shenanigans including another water dump: Thanks again and I promise I will get to a hotel review eventually, I think the time change and lack of sleep caught up to me as I napped a lot this afternoon. Rome was all go go go for us as you saw 🙃. Tomorrow, we are in the first port of the cruise, Chania, and doing a walking tour with very little description so wish us luck there. Thanks and TTYL! - Ashley

Hi Everyone! We obviously made it on board the beautiful Odyssey of the Seas so here is a wrap up of our boarding day yesterday. In the morning, we went to the same cafe near our hotel for coffee and pastries. After that, we got a porter to help us take our luggage down to the hotel lobby where our driver picked us up promptly at 10am. We used Stefano's Rome Cabs for our transfers between the airport, hotel, and ship. We have been very happy with them. We booked them through Viator (you can find the Viator links on their TripAdvisor). From there, we arrived at the port a little more than an hour later just after 11am. At the port, porters approached us to help with the checked luggage right away and then we walked in with them and they directed us through security. Security was a breeze. After that, we lined up for check in, they checked our passports and set sail passes and gave us a boarding number. In order to get a suite/pinnacle number, we then had to walk up to the Key sign to get our number replaced with a suites card so we could board immediately. This process was a bit confusing as there was no signage in the terminal for suites, only the Key, and it was after check in and receiving another number. Once we got the suite number, we proceeded to boarding. After boarding the ship, we headed straight to our muster station to check in. We watched the safety video while we were driving to the port so it was very quick, they scanned our set sail passes and we were done with the worst part 🙌. After that, we headed up to Coastal Kitchen where we saw Mihai, the Coastal Kitchen manager, who is on board until we get to Turkey and Jose, the Coastal Kitchen host who was also on board in December, along with most of the same wait staff. We were seated right away for lunch. While we were waiting for our food, I headed over to the reservations desk by Teppanyaki to get our reservations set for the rest of the cruise for our 5 night dining package as well as an Izumi Sushi lunch one sea day. By the time I was done making reservations, our food had arrived: Our staterooms opened at 1pm so by the time we were done with lunch, our staterooms were ready so we headed down to them. Our cases were shockingly already outside our door so we unpacked and then it was time for a short and very interrupted by announcements nap before getting ready for dinner. They did a diamond and above sail away party at 4:30pm in the Music Hall but we all decided we needed to take a nap instead, it was a busy few days in Rome. We then got ready for 8pm dinner in Coastal Kitchen. Before dinner, we had some drinks in Giovanni’s wine bar and then headed up to dinner: After dinner, we had some drinks in the pub. The compass had an error and it was actually the pub player’s off night so I can’t comment on him yet but hopefully I will see him tonight. I have heard he plays Alice so I will definitely report back on the front. Anyways, here were some of our drinks in the pub as well as our first water and soda dump from our vouchers: And then we headed to bed, we lost an hour last night as we moved to Greece time. I will try to post tonight about our hotel in Rome. Thanks and TTYL! - Ashley

Hi All, We made it onboard the Odyssey of the Seas today but once again I need to catch up on what we did yesterday. I have a feeling I am going to be continually behind but hopefully I will be able to catch up since tomorrow is a sea day but then I might quickly end up behind again as the port days start. Anyways all of that to say just bear with me 🫣. Ok so back to yesterday. We started our day heading to a cafe near the hotel for coffee and pastries. We opted to not do the hotel breakfast again after the first time so I literally searched coffee shop on Google maps and went to the first place that showed up. Here are some pictures of the pastries and coffee: After that, we once again ordered an Uber and headed to the restaurant for our cooking class. The class was called “3 in 1 Cooking Class near Navona: Fettuccine, Ravioli & Tiramisu” and was conducted in the back room of a restaurant. Promptly at the start time of the class, our chef instructor Danilo came out to check us in for the class and had us come in and wash our hands before starting with the Tiramisu. Danilo already had the eggs separated in two bowls and then added sugar to the yolks. From there he asked for two volunteers to use the hand mixers to beat the egg whites and beat the yolks. I volunteered and ended up beating the yolks and sugar mixture. About halfway through the beating process we stopped and he got another volunteer up to drop spoonfuls of mascarpone in the yolk mixture as I continued beating with the hand mixer. Once the egg whites were stiff and the yolks, sugar, and mascarpone mixture was completely mixed, my job was done. From there he had a few more volunteers come up to fold the egg whites into the yolks mixture. My dad volunteered for this part and ended up being on of the people doing the folding. From there, Danilo instructed us how to assemble the tiramisu. We each were given a glass and two lady fingers (they have a much nicer Italian name that I don’t remember 🙃). They had bowls of brewed coffee on the tables and we broke the lady fingers in half and quickly dipped the first half in the coffee and smushed it on the bottom of the cup (smushed is a technical term 😂). We then layered in the cream, the other half of the lady fingers dipped in coffee but not smushed and some more cream. Finally, we topped it off with cocoa powder. We then labeled our cups of tiramisu and put them on trays to go chill while we prepared our pasta. For the pasta making, we did the whole process by hand including the rolling and cutting. Danilo demonstrated each step and also came around to help. My mom has never been the cook in my household (she likes to talk about how she failed home ec in high school), and she required a lot of assistance to get the pasta mixed, kneaded, and rolled out. Thankfully he helped her out otherwise she wouldn’t have had lunch, he said there was one of her in every class 🤣. Not only did we cut thicker fettuccine noodles, we also filled and cut ravioli. We were given a card to write our name on and select one of three sauces for our fettuccine. My mom and I both selected cacio e pepe and my dad selected a tomato sauce with pork in it called Amatriciana. From there we left our finished pasta on our boards with the cards and headed to the actual restaurant side of the space to sit down at a large table as a group to enjoy what we made. The server came around with some house wine for everyone and then our pasta started coming out as it was prepared. Unfortunately one of my ravioli burst in the water so I lost one but it was still really cool eating what we just made. After we ate our pasta, they passed out our tiramisu and each enjoyed what we made. It was definitely a fun experience that while not a typical tour was a fun way to experience Rome. The class was operated by Eat and Walk Italy and I once again purchased it through Viator. The whole thing including the lunch took about 3 hours and at the end we got to download a recipe booklet of what we cooked to keep. The same operator also offers pizza and other classes and all the recipes for all the classes are included in the recipe booklet. Here are some pictures I took at the class: After the class, we finally had some free time so we walked to the Spanish steps (about a half mile from where the class was) and did some shopping. Let’s just say we did some damage and now have to figure out the VAT refund process when we leave FCO in 2 weeks. I will report back how that goes if we are successful. From there we got ditched by an Uber driver who started driving in circles trying to get us to cancel until he finally canceled so we ended up shopping some more before getting a cab at a taxi stand to get back to our hotel. We once again ate dinner at the pizza place near our hotel. Here are our pictures from this time: After that we got some gelato near our hotel: And finally went back to our rooms to pack up and prepare to board the ship the next day. Overall, this was our most relaxed day in Rome and definitely needed after the 2 busy days prior. My next post will probably be a shorter post about boarding day, it was rather uneventful as everything went pretty smoothly, as well as finally a hotel review. Spoiler: we definitely would recommend the Doubletree by Hilton Rome Monti. Thanks again for reading and TTYL! - Ashley

Yeah, we have been quite happy with how well she has kept up and how much she has been able to walk, although the cruise tours will definitely be the test. Thankfully, she definitely still can walk, her mobility issues are extremely minor compared to some. She had brain surgery in 2022 to remove a benign tumor and that caused numbness in her right foot. She went to physical therapy then for it and bounced back for the most part. Unfortunately, the fall in February re-triggered her symptoms again so she has been going to PT again and also trying acupuncture even (which shocked me considering she has an extreme fear of needles so I guess that is just how bothered she is with her foot). All her doctors told her to walk and go on this trip, just not to overdo it, especially after she had a panic attack a few weeks after falling when I spent the day walking around the Tempe Arts Festival with her and we ended up in the ER after (although a theme for her has also been dehydration, and that definitely was a factor that day, hence why we have been trying to keep her with a refillable water bottle where we can). And obviously the numbness makes her a bit unsteady so my dad and I have been assisting her with steps and things where we think we should. At home, she just started driving again a bit since the fall but doesn't feel comfortable yet behind the wheel (considering the numbness is in her right foot) and we definitely aren't pushing her there. I hope this trip is a nice break for her from the stress of that at home. - Ashley

Hey Guys! Back from a fun day of pasta cooking and shopping to recap yesterday, Friday, our second full day in Rome. Yesterday was another cold and rainy day. The first half of the day we took a semi private tour of the Vatican and the second half of the day we had a walking food tour. We started our day with breakfast at the hotel. While it was very civilized for hotel breakfast, the coffee was self serve at a crown lounge/suite lounge-esque coffee machine and not good according to both my parents who are coffee drinkers (I am not so I would not be the one to ask), and the food was just ok (this I can confirm myself). I forgot to catch pictures but needless to say we are not going to be doing it again. We then ordered an Uber and headed on our way to the Vatican and the meeting point for our Vatican tour. One quick note about Ubers in Rome: there is only Uber Black offered, you can also use the Uber app to order a cab but we haven’t tried that, we have stuck to Uber black as well as traditional taxi stands when they are convenient for us. You can’t just hail a cab in Rome, you have to go to a Taxi stand and in some cases that additional walking to find a taxi stand is not great for my mom. Anyways, after about a 30 minute ride with some traffic, we made it to our meeting point for our tour, the Caffe Vaticano, and it seems most tours meet outside of there so it was quite hectic. That combined with that fact that it started down pouring rain shortly after we got there provided for some interesting challenges. We were also a bit early for our meeting time. Anyways, after a short time the LivTours check in person arrived and we checked in and were pointed to our guide, Monica. The tour was just us and one other couple for a total of 5 guests. We headed across the street to the Vatican Museum. The entry times had gotten backed up, not entirely sure why but we waited a bit with our group (in the down pouring rain) before we were allowed to enter. Once we entered, we went through security. Security was very simple, you had your bags go through an x ray machine and walked through a metal detector. I had read online that they didn’t like reusable water bottles so we opted not to use ours as we didn’t want them taken away but the other couple in our group had theres and had no issue so in retrospect we would have been fine but your mileage may vary. It also looked like there was a bag check for oversized bags. Not entirely sure the rules there nor how you would be able to get them back since you don’t end the tour at the starting point so probably a good idea to look at the size restrictions on the Vatican website. My dad had a classic Jansport backpack with some jackets and umbrellas in it and had no issues, and same with my mom’s and my crossbody Travelon bags. Once through security, our guide had us take a brief pause to use the facilities and also dry off a bit. There was literally a line for the hand dryer in the women’s restroom but I managed to use it to dry off my jacket and it was better than nothing but I definitely did the tour pretty drenched. Speaking of my Travelon, it was also completely soaked including all the contents. I just had to live with it for the duration of the tour. We then re-grouped and were given radios to wear throughout the museum, even though our group was small, our guide Monica didn’t want to have any issues since it was extremely crowded. We then entered the museum. We spent about 1.5 hours going through the museum, after losing the first half hour of the tour to the wait outside as well as security, etc. It was very busy but Monica did a great job of keeping the group together as she talked us through each gallery. She shared loads of anecdotes about each room and I don’t know what we would have done without a guide in there. It was truly overwhelming between the crowds and the sheer magnitude of it. I think I took close to 100 pictures in the museum. We then spent about 15 minutes in the Sistine Chapel. Before the Sistine Chapel, she talked us through what the different paintings on the ceiling were and what they represented and prepped us where to meet her after our 15 minutes were up since she wasn’t allowed to guide us through that part. Then, we exited the museum, and had to turn back in our radios as they were the ones owned by the museum. From there, we proceeded directly into St. Peter’s Basilica. The biggest advantage of doing a guided tour was that we directly entered St. Peters from the museum and did not have to wait in the general entrance line. As someone who has waited in that line multiple times before, I can confirm this is a great perk. Once inside St. Peters, we spent the last half hour of the tour going through the highlights of the property. All in all, the tour was 3 hours long. Monica also gave us some advice about where to go while in Rome at the end of the tour. She really was a great and thorough guide and we were extremely impressed. As I said earlier, the tour was operated by LivTours and I purchased it through Viator. It was called “Rome: Skip the Line Vatican, Sistine Chapel, St Peter 6 PAX Group”. It was pricey, but definitely worth it and a lot cheaper than a completely private tour, even after factoring in the cost to Uber there (the private version of the tour offers a hotel pickup). The was my 3rd time to the Vatican and St. Peters but I definitely got the most out of it doing a guided tour. It was also our first time going into the Vatican museum and the Sistine chapel so those were both very neat experiences. Probably the closest thing I have to compare it to was when we did the hermitage museum in St. Petersburg in 2016 in terms of how crowded it was (I know, probably a terrible comparison), but I got a lot more out of this thanks to how small our group was and the truly fantastic guide. Here are some photos from the experience (I took a ton so this is just a few to give you an idea): After St. Peters, we headed out to the Vatican and found a side street where we were able to order an Uber to pick us up and take us to our hotel. Thankfully the rain had stopped and the weather was starting to clear up. One good thing we have noticed is we have had an easier time finding Uber pickup points on side streets here than in other cities such as London. We had originally planned to spend some time shopping and exploring independently then but we were all a bit tired from the Vatican between the crowds and the weather along with the walking and many steps. The tour is definitely not handicap accessible, which we knew going into it, but I don’t think we realized the amount of walking for my mom. Thankfully, she was a trooper but we definitely all needed a siesta after. We opted to skip lunch as we knew our food walking tour later would have enough food to suffice for lunch and dinner. After an afternoon siesta, we once again took an Uber from our hotel to our meeting point for the 5:45pm walking tour. It was about a 15 minute drive from our hotel to the Piazza Mattei, the starting point for our tour. We had gotten in the habit of leaving early for tours to account for crazy Rome traffic (I could literally go on a diatribe about how crazy people drive in Rome but I won’t, I will just say I am constantly amazed I have not seen an accident here) so once there, we stopped in a bar so my dad could get some coffee. Many of the bars here also have espresso machines so you can order cappuccino, americano, espresso, etc. We then headed out a few minutes before the meeting time when it became obvious that other people were there waiting for our tour and our guide Andrea arrived promptly on time. We had a group of 10 people for this tour and it was a really great mix of people in our group. From there, we headed into the Jewish Ghetto where we started our tour covering some of the Jewish history in Rome, including the history of the Jewish Ghetto and saw one of the only synagogues in Rome, lots of Kosher restaurants that were closed for the sabbath since it was a Friday night, as well as one thing I remembered from Amsterdam last year: Stumbling Stones aka Stolperstein. They are these metal cobblestones in front of properties where people who were sent to concentration camps lived prior to World War II. They contain inscriptions with the names, birthdates, and other details about the people who lived there. It was truly sad to see so many of these again especially when you think about how only a handful of Italian Jews who were sent to concentration camps survived and the unfortunate parallels with current events. Most of the Jewish population in Rome still lives in this area and we saw numerous Israel flags outside windows and a very sad Bring them Home banner, none of which were things I anticipated seeing in Rome. Our guide Andrea then took us to our first stop. It was a Kosher-style restaurant. Here, we ate "carciofo alla giudìa" which are artichokes fried and salted. They were actually really good, quite the unexpected gem of the tour. Our guide talked about how over time the Jewish people had become good at taking cheap ingredients and making them taste really good, and frying anything makes it taste good. Our next stop was another Kosher Style restaurant where we had a sampling of 3 different appetizers: roasted zucchini, roasted tomatoes, and anchovies. These were all a bit unexpected. After that stop, we headed out of the Jewish ghetto and got a taste of two different types of Roman style pizza: Pizza Marinara and Pizza Margherita. Roman style pizza is a square pizza that is a bit thicker than Neapolitan style pizza but it is cooked at an extremely hot temperature so it gets really crispy. It is also sold by weight so you literally tell them how much you want and they cut off a piece and weigh it for you. We enjoyed the pizza with some Peroni beer. Next, we headed to Campo de' Fiori where we learned the history of this square, went on a little quest for a Virgin Mary, and then headed to our next restaurant where we sampled some pasta dishes. The restaurant was a very unique location with some literal ruins in the basement. At that restaurant, we sampled 3 kinds of pasta and an eggplant dish. My favorites were the cacao e pepe and the eggplant dish (kind of like lasagna made with slices of eggplant, I think they called it eggplant parmesan but it was definitely different than the fried dish with that name that I have had before. We also had a choice of a glass of white or red house wine at this location. My dad says he has not found a bad house wine in Italy yet and he is finding lots of great, inexpensive wines here so he has been happy (heck, the 3 bottles he bought on Thursday for the cruise were combined cheaper than many single bottles he buys at home, granted he does have expensive taste). Next up we headed to Piazza Navona for some Tiramisu. From there our guide talked us through the history of the square as well as explained one of the Baroque fountains to us. Finally, our last two stops were for espresso and gelato. Once again, I am not a coffee drinker and it was both too late for my mom to drink coffee and she also only likes her coffee heavily polluted with cream and sugar but my dad partook in the espresso and he continues to rave about it. He is comparing his shot of espresso to a milkshake in consistency… take with that what you will but he loved it. Finally, we headed over to a Gelato place and got a choice of a cup or cone with two flavors. I personally had Hazelnut and Cream in a cone and it was really good. I haven’t had bad gelato here yet, and the same story with tiramisu. From there the guide Andrea wrapped up our tour. All in all it was about 4 hours long. My parents and I definitely enjoyed this tour as well. It was the second year in a row of great food tours abroad for use as we also had a great one in Amsterdam last year. This tour was called “Jewish Ghetto and Campo Dè Fiori By Night Food, Wine and Sightseeing Tour” and it was operated by Food Tours of Rome purchased through Viator. I would also like to add from a walking standpoint that it was definitely less walking than the Vatican tour in the morning and the walking was more spread out in terms of being a slower pace with longer stops. My mom had no issues other than needing some assistance from my dad on some steps. Here are some photos from the food walking tour: After the tour we Uber’ed back to the hotel to get to bed after our longest day out in Rome. Thankfully, today the weather improved and we were finally able to enjoy some time outside independently. I will try to get in a post about today tomorrow sometime but tomorrow is probably going to be a busy day as we are finally boarding the beautiful Odyssey of the Seas in Civitavecchia. Also, I promise I will do a thorough hotel review in the next few days. Thanks again and TTYL! - Ashley

We definitely enjoyed the Golf Cart tour! We did it through Rolling Rome (booked on Viator) but lots of operators have them, I just used trip advisor reviews combined with availability to decide which one to book. The private ones like we did are fully customizable so you really get out what you want to. The Vatican tour today was also booked through Viator operated by LivTours. Our guide today there was absolutely wonderful, I would definitely recommend that tour. It was called "Rome: Skip the Line Vatican, Sistine Chapel, St Peter 6 PAX Group". I will be posting more details on how it went later as today was a long day but I would say it was definitely worth it. Yes, sadly I do. We walked through the Jewish Ghetto tonight on our food tour and it was heartbreaking see a big "bring them home" banner there. I never would have thought this would still be going on and wish that the hostages could all be returned home. Also saw numerous Israeli flags hanging out of windows. I am doing a bad job of keeping up with the news while on vacation but I just wish the ridiculous protesting and encampments on college campuses would stop as well. Anyways, end rant, I am sure you could have predicted where I stood on this issue. I did say I was grateful our itinerary was changed early enough that we had time to prepare, unlike obviously this same cruise in both October and May last year (in May, rockets were being shot at Israel, the Odyssey was literally docked with passengers going through immigration when they decided to cancel the port). It has been a bit unseasonably cold for this time of the year in Rome. Our highs the past 2 days were in the mid 60s and of course it rained both days. I am a bad judge of cold being from Phoenix though. Tomorrow it should be a bit more normal in the low to mid 70s and sunny.

Hi Everyone! Just got back from our Vatican tour. My parents are in siesta mode before our food tour tonight so I figured now was a good time to catch up on yesterday’s activities. Yesterday we did a private golf cart tour booked through Viator operated by Rolling Rome. The driver picked us up from our hotel at 10am and it was a seven hour tour so we were dropped off back at our hotel at 5pm. Unfortunately yesterday morning started off quite rainy so the rain shields were down on our golf card but thankfully it cleared up for the afternoon and we were able to roll up the rain shields. As far as itinerary, we pretty much left it up to our driver/tour guide Antonio, although I did tell him we had a tour booked at the Vatican so we didn’t need to see that. Also told him that we have been to Rome a few times before so we didn’t need to try to squeeze everything in (for example, the Trevi Fountain was very packed yesterday as was the Pantheon so we skipped those this time). We did see a couple churches, the Borghese gardens, the Spanish Steps, the Colosseum, the Spanish steps, Circus Maximus, and a few other sites that I can’t remember anymore. The tour also included lunch and gelato so at 1pm we stopped for lunch and afterwards had gelato. Our driver also took us for some Italian pastries at the end, I don’t think those were supposed to be included in the tour but I think he liked to treat his guests but not sure honestly. My parents didn’t get coffee before the tour yesterday so I did request a stop for coffee at the beginning so he did take us to a cafe with coffee and pastries to satisfy that need, we paid for that ourselves of course. Anyways, the tour was overall a pretty good tour and I think you could cover a lot of ground if you needed to and it wasn’t raining. It was also kind of fun being in the golf cart and being able to ride through lots of interesting areas that are not accessible by car. It worked out really well for my mom since we didn’t do a crazy amount of walking. Here are some assorted photos from our tour yesterday: After the tour yesterday, we got back to the hotel, we walked over to the termini station as my mom needed something from Sephora that she forgot (and she is the one with a packing list 🤦‍♀️) and then went to a pizza place near our hotel for dinner. Here are some assorted photos from dinner: After dinner, we went to a wine shop near our hotel so my dad could buy some bottles to carry on the cruise on Sunday. Here are the bottles my dad selected with the help of someone at the store: Then it was time for bed as we knew the next day (today) was going to be an earlier day since we needed to get breakfast before heading to the Vatican. As I said earlier, this morning we did the Vatican and rain came down again. Tonight we are doing a food walking after some rest. I will try to post about that either tonight or tomorrow sometime. I also finally got photos of my parent’s half of then hotel room so I will talk about the hotel in the next couple days sometime. Tomorrow morning we have a pasta cooking class (when in Rome I guess!) and then are free the rest of the day to relax (and maybe shop if my mom gets her way) before getting on the ship on Sunday. Thanks again for reading and TTYL! - Ashley

Cool! Just going by the terrible description on the cruise planner for the tour, and some comments in some other older threads on here, clearly I need to research this topic more. Thanks!