First trip to Europe.

[Tar Pit]

First post..................... :rolleyes:

 

Looking to take the wife on a European cruise for our 25th. wedding anniversary in 2014. We have never been to Europe so seeing the "must see things" is high on the list. We would be traveling Sept-Oct and have 14 days or so to work with. Looking for a smaller ship with good shore tours. We don't need over the top luxury, and we like all inclusive so we will pay the extra for that.

 

Any and all suggestions are welcome.

 

Thanks.

Tar Pit the scallywag.:p

[RoofingPrincess]

None of the mass-market cruise lines marketed in the US are all-inclusive; you'll have to go to a luxury line for that.

Since you have plenty of time to plan, I recommend sitting down with a cruise specialist at a brick-and-mortar travel agency. S/he can show you what the options are, and what costs are associated with them. You may make some preliminary decisions based on the 2012 and 2013 schedules and itineraries, but you'll have to wait to make final decisions as the 2014 information won't be available for a while yet.

Since you've never been to Europe, I recommend allotting a few of your days to pre-cruise travel. It's a good idea to fly in at least the day before your cruise leaves, anyway, and you'll want to adjust (jet lag on an eastbound flight) and do some touring in the departure city.

[bbwex]

I would agree that since you have not done this before, find a good TA and sit down and start to get some ideas at least. You can, then, bounce some of the ideas off the people here on CC.

 

You have already been told that "all-inclusive" is a luxury line thing, and you generally pay for everything whether you take advantage or not. Their ships are smaller, but you can get a nice, reasonably small ship from Oceania (their R ships) or Azamara that sails the same size ships. These are premium lines rather than luxury, are not all-inclusive, but are extremely nice and the service is great.

 

As for tours, they can be included by some of the luxury lines, but you can at least consider doing private tours. They are surprisingly easy to set up. Once you know where you are going, go on the Ports of Call board and start to read and ask questions. You can also use shoretrips.com and they will give you a list of the tours that they have in every city. We used them (they are not the only company that operates in most ports), but spent time on the Ports of Call board and found things to add here and there. You can do that on a private tour, but not on a ship's tour. Doing a private tour for just the two of you can be more expensive, but once you have your cruise set up, then you can go on the Roll Call section of CC, go to your specific cruise and try to find some others to share the tours. We had either 6 or 8 of us on our tours in the Baltic, and it was great. No being held back by some slower people, and the small vans can move in and around traffic better than a large bus.

 

You can just go with ship's tours, of course, and that is certainly the easiest route to take, but I found it to be a lot of fun to spend more time doing my own planning. I didn't let it overwhelm me, and I didn't read tons of books or anything, but we used established tour companies and then added a little something here, and a little something there.

[paul929207]

You need to think about which places(s) you really want to see. There are exceptions, but most cruises fall into one of these categories:

 

- Baltic Sea

- British Isles

- Western Med

- Eastern Med

[marco]

Depending on what you want to see and in which countries, give some consideration to a river cruise. We've done several "ocean liner" European cruises, several land tours and several river cruises. As this is your first trip to Europe and you have some "must see's" on your list, keep in mind in most ports on an "ocean liner" cruise, you are in port pretty much 9 to 5, and depending how far you are from the city, it can really limit the amount of time you have to see and do. You might be disappointed in that once getting to the city you want to see several things in, you might have to "pick one" because of time constraints. Also, you rarely will be able to experience any city at night. Granted, a river cruise is a very different experience than an "ocean liner" cruise, but we've always felt that we saw and experienced WAY, WAY much more by taking a river cruise over any "ocean liner" cruise and it was a much more significant and memorable cultural experience. The guides have always been excellent and thorough and pretty much all tours, entrances, excursions, sightseeing is included as well and wines on a lot of lines with lunch and dinner. When all was said and done, we spent very, very little above the base cost of the trip. Check them out.

[VMax1700]

please don't fall into the trap of thinking you can 'do Europe' in 14 days! You will want 2/3 days at your departure port which could be Barcelona or Rome or Venice! If your disembarcation port is different to your departure port then you could want another 2/3 days there!

 

You have plenty of time to do some research, so think about where you would like to see this trip, reduce the list to 5 or 6 places then see if any cruise line does them in one trip. Its unlikely that you will get an exact match, but its a starting point.

 

As mentioned above by Paul929207, think about which area you are most interested in. Greek Island or Italy or France of British Isles.

 

Anyway you have plenty of time so enjoy the research.

[Azulann]

Besides talking to a travel agent, have a "dream" conversation with your wife. When you think about Europe what comes to mind: history, good food, castles, islands, beaches, art museums , sitting in a square drinking a glass of wine and watching the world go by....

What are you nervous about: language barrier, lots of walking, different interests, trying different foods, long flights...

 

Take your top three dreams and then go to the travel agent. They will help you with the cruise, itinerary, which port city , and pre-cruise and post cruise hotels , airfare.

 

Kepp asking questions here on CC.

Half the fun is planing your dream vacation. Enjoy!:)

[sparky-elpaso]

Depending on what you want to see and in which countries, give some consideration to a river cruise. We've done several "ocean liner" European cruises, several land tours and several river cruises. As this is your first trip to Europe and you have some "must see's" on your list, keep in mind in most ports on an "ocean liner" cruise, you are in port pretty much 9 to 5, and depending how far you are from the city, it can really limit the amount of time you have to see and do. You might be disappointed in that once getting to the city you want to see several things in, you might have to "pick one" because of time constraints. Also, you rarely will be able to experience any city at night. Granted, a river cruise is a very different experience than an "ocean liner" cruise, but we've always felt that we saw and experienced WAY, WAY much more by taking a river cruise over any "ocean liner" cruise and it was a much more significant and memorable cultural experience. The guides have always been excellent and thorough and pretty much all tours, entrances, excursions, sightseeing is included as well and wines on a lot of lines with lunch and dinner. When all was said and done, we spent very, very little above the base cost of the trip. Check them out.

 

Which river cruise line did you go with? Sounds interesting.

[kitty9]

The US based cruise lines are not all inclusive unless you go with one of the luxury lines. An all inclusive line such as Seabourn or Crystal would cost you three to four times the cost of a non-inclusive line. For instance, you could do a 14 day Med cruise on Celebrity, in a veranda, for $2300 a person. A comparable room on an all inclusive will be around $7000+ per person. That's a pretty big difference.

 

You won't even be able to start looking asurge fall of 2014 until the winter of 2013, so you have a lot of time to think. Cruise lines won't have their itineraries or pricing for 2014 until about 18 months out.

[chipmaster]

Welcome to CC and congrats!

 

European cruise is a complicated thing. Many ports and attractions are accessible from a cruise ship port, others not so much. What is one person's must see may not be anothers. Here is one web site worth looking at to see you get in each port: http://www.europeportreviews.com/

 

Almost every major cruise line has ships sailing Europe. The permutations are many and taylored to many different price and service levels. As a rule unless you go really upscale you will need to spend "extra" for in port.

 

For mainstream lines Princess/RCCL etc. expect to spend 50-200/per person/day for the very best experience. Some ports are easy to do for cheap some less so, and it also depends on how you like to sight see, eat, etc. etc.

 

If you are a novice take a look at TA, but IMHO unless you are lucky they will likely give you a bunch of brochures and not have more real personal information than what you might get here on the European boards here: http://boards.cruisecritic.com/forumdisplay.php?f=19

 

Good luck!

 

First post..................... :rolleyes:

 

Looking to take the wife on a European cruise for our 25th. wedding anniversary in 2014. We have never been to Europe so seeing the "must see things" is high on the list. We would be traveling Sept-Oct and have 14 days or so to work with. Looking for a smaller ship with good shore tours. We don't need over the top luxury, and we like all inclusive so we will pay the extra for that.

 

Any and all suggestions are welcome.

 

Thanks.

Tar Pit the scallywag.:p

[helpthejuggler]

In Europe the choice of ports is far more important than the line/ship you choose. The trips are port-intensive and our recent trip started with 5 full days in port. When we reached the first sea day it was very welcome.

 

On a first visit try to maximise the time available on land. Some cruise lines spend more time in port each day and this is worth paying attention to during your planning. A couple of extra hours can give you so many more options with excursions or just make the days more relaxing.

 

I recommend something with different start/end ports with a 11/12 night cruise in the middle.

 

Many popular Med routes start/end in Rome/Venice/Barcelona/Istanbul each of which are great ports. There are cruises that include all four of these for a real tour of the highlights.

 

With your time constraints, I would avoid a UK departure for the Med as time 2 days at the start & end of the cruise eats into your options.

 

You wont be able to see everything and hopefully you will see enough to plan a return in the future.

 

I'd try to include Venice as the sail-in/out is one of the most amazing experiences. Fortunately most of the 10+ night cruises will give you this. Check the time of your sail in/out as a sail-in at 5am on your final cruise day into Venice misses this highlight.

 

Rome is a hard to ignore and it really pays to make it one of your end points. The return travel time from the port at Civitavecchia consumes a couple of hours from your day. Staying pre/post cruise in Rome really pays off as there is just too much to see in a single port day and when lit at night the sights become even more astounding. On a port day you miss this wonderful part of the day.

 

Time is on your side and I got great value from Rick Steves book on Mediterranean Cruise Ports.

 

Whatever you choose I'm sure it will be a fantastic wedding anniversary.

[marco]

Regarding river cruises, we've done Viking (1), Grand Circle Travel (3) and Vantage (3) and I would recommend any of them.