Review from the Epic Mediterranean from a first-time cruiser! (Long overdue)

[Sammae]

Hello all!

I've been thinking about writing this review for months, and now I'm finally doing it. My husband and I, both 26 and from Ottawa, Canada, cruised the Epic in the Mediterranean from September 18-25, 2011. We had an absolutely amazing trip!! Here's a little breakdown of our cruise, and I'll try to figure out how to get pictures in here.

 

Barcelona and Embarkation:

BEAUTIFUL city! We've both agreed that if there was one place we could go back to, it would be Barcelona. We stayed at the GranHotel Torre Catalunya, which was close to Plaça d'Espanya. It was a great, affordable hotel with very friendly staff and in a good location close to the Magic Fountain, Subway and Trains.

 

On cruise day, we took a cab from the hotel to the Pier for around 20 euros. We got to the pier at around 11:30 and there was already a line waiting to check luggage! We were approached by a porter, tipped him 5E, and he took care of our bags for us, so we skipped the line and walked right into the terminal! Good deal! Inside the terminal, we were able to walk right up to a check-in counter and check-in was a breeze! Then we went up the escalator and right onto the ship!

 

Day 1:

As soon as you're on ship, they take your picture, and I look like a kid in a candy store! I have to say, first stepping on board was overwhelming. I had every intention of going to O'Sheehan's for lunch, but we were herded into an elevator and ended up at the Buffet. Oh well! It was Sunny and a little warm out, and we ate outside. Our rooms were ready by about 12:30, which was much earlier then we'd expected! We were in BA cabin 11174. We spent a few hours unpacking, enjoying the view from our balcony and then exploring the ship. Afterwards, we checked out the start of the sail-away party on deck, which was a blast, then we donned our bathing suits, mixed ourselves a drink, and headed to the hot-tub for sail-away! Best way to do it!! Although drinking in the hot tub wasn't our greatest idea... After a few blurry hours, we got dressed up and went to the Manhattan Room for dinner. We had a window seat, and could watch just how wavy it was! Things were starting to get a little choppy! Dinner was wonderful. We played a few slots (get slot play coupons online before you go!) then turned in for the night. Great first day!!

 

(I'm going to have to work on adding photos later! Off to work!)

[mander3117]

I'm looking forward to reading the rest of your review! My husband and I are doing our first cruise (NCL Pearl Western Caribbean) in 2 weeks!! The European cruises are intriguing me, and with you being a first time cruiser and doing a Europe itinerary, I can't wait to hear more! Thanks for posting!

[Sammae]

Figured it out!

Day 1 photos:

 

 

Sail Away Party on pool deck!

 

View from our balcony

 

Dinner at Manhattan's

[AttilaTheFun]

Great start! We're booked for Epic in May on a Europe sailing, so very excited to hear the rest of your review!

 

Did you have any safety issues in Barcelona? I've read so many horror stories about pickpockets that I'm very concerned.

[pkt1976]

great review so far, can't wait to see more!!!

[SuiteCruiser]

Hello all!

I've been thinking about writing this review for months, and now I'm finally doing it. My husband and I, both 26 and from Ottawa, Canada, cruised the Epic in the Mediterranean from September 18-25, 2011. We had an absolutely amazing trip!! Here's a little breakdown of our cruise, and I'll try to figure out how to get pictures in here.

 

Barcelona and Embarkation:

BEAUTIFUL city! We've both agreed that if there was one place we could go back to, it would be Barcelona. We stayed at the GranHotel Torre Catalunya, which was close to Plaça d'Espanya. It was a great, affordable hotel with very friendly staff and in a good location close to the Magic Fountain, Subway and Trains.

 

On cruise day, we took a cab from the hotel to the Pier for around 20 euros. We got to the pier at around 11:30 and there was already a line waiting to check luggage! We were approached by a porter, tipped him 5E, and he took care of our bags for us, so we skipped the line and walked right into the terminal! Good deal! Inside the terminal, we were able to walk right up to a check-in counter and check-in was a breeze! Then we went up the escalator and right onto the ship!

 

Day 1:

As soon as you're on ship, they take your picture, and I look like a kid in a candy store! I have to say, first stepping on board was overwhelming. I had every intention of going to O'Sheehan's for lunch, but we were herded into an elevator and ended up at the Buffet. Oh well! It was Sunny and a little warm out, and we ate outside. Our rooms were ready by about 12:30, which was much earlier then we'd expected! We were in BA cabin 11174. We spent a few hours unpacking, enjoying the view from our balcony and then exploring the ship. Afterwards, we checked out the start of the sail-away party on deck, which was a blast, then we donned our bathing suits, mixed ourselves a drink, and headed to the hot-tub for sail-away! Best way to do it!! Although drinking in the hot tub wasn't our greatest idea... After a few blurry hours, we got dressed up and went to the Manhattan Room for dinner. We had a window seat, and could watch just how wavy it was! Things were starting to get a little choppy! Dinner was wonderful. We played a few slots (get slot play coupons online before you go!) then turned in for the night. Great first day!!

 

(I'm going to have to work on adding photos later! Off to work!)

 

Very fun to relive it!! My 2 friends and I were on the same sailing and we're from Ottawa. We stayed at the W Barcelona on the way in and at the Hotel Nouvel on the way out.

 

Best cruise yet, and I have 20 or so under my belt.

 

Keep going, very excited to relive it all :)

[woody73]

 

. . . Although drinking in the hot tub wasn't our greatest idea . . . After a few blurry hours, we got dressed up and went to the Manhattan Room for dinner.

LOL!

 

I'm enjoying your review, and looking forward to more.

 

Woody

[SallyStrawberry]

We're on the May 6th cruise on the Epic too! Look forward to reading more of your review.

[Sammae]

Day 2 started really early, as we woke up around 2:30am to have a conversation about whether the drinks were making the room sway the way it was, or whether the ship was moving that much (which would account for all the creaking noises!). Finally I got up to investigate, had a "Holy Crap!" moment and called DH over to look out the balcony. Massive waves! We went back to sleep, happy that it was the ship, not our heads, and woke up bright and early at 7am.

 

We dressed and went up to the buffet for breakfast. I needed to try the smoked salmon (yum!). Breakfast started out great, but after about 20 minutes of sitting high up in a swaying ship, we started to feel a little motion sick. I never get motion sick, but I sure wasn't feeling good today! We wandered around until 11am, when we met up in the Bliss Lounge for our Meet and Greet. This was great! We met up with Fran, Bill, Theresa, Leanne, Jenn and Billy who we had met here on CC and were touring with on Day 3 out of Livorno. The Senior Officers made an appearance and spoke to us, which was really nice. It was great to meet some people that we would run into as the week wore on.

 

As the afternoon wore on, it became apparent that it was not going to be a pool day. The wind was just insane and the ship was pitching so much that the pools were left empty. At about 2:30pm we were walking through the buffet and there were dishes flying off the tables and counters, and people were walking in not-so-straight lines. We thought the whole thing was hilarious!

 

Dinner that night was at Moderno. Thankfully we were feeling better by this point! It was a really neat experience. The meats were all wonderful, but the salad bar would have me going back! It was hard not to fill up on it so I could enjoy all the other offerings! We saw the Blue Man Group after dinner. It was very funny! We really enjoyed it!! We were in bed right after the show because the next day was a big one! Livorno!

 

Moderno is on the right, Cagney's on the left and the yummy salad bar down the centre:

 

We were able to watch the Motown show going on in the Manhattan Room from our table at Moderno!

 

The stage at Blue Man group:

[Sammae]

Thanks guys for the positive feedback! It's fun finally writing this!

 

Attila: We had heard about Barcelona before going, so we were wary about how we carried our things while we were there. We never had anything other then sweaters and water in the backpack. All of our important things were in my cross-body bag, which I always kept near my front. I'm sure I looked like a dork, but we didn't lose our stuff! Barcelona is a VERY beautiful city. It's clean, the people are nice, it's easy to get around and it's very lively! We never felt unsafe walking around at night. As long as you use your head, you'll be fine.

 

SuiteCruiser: It's so funny thinking that people from home would be so close by in the Mediterranean! I hope to sail the Epic again some day. We loved it so much!

[Sammae]

I woke up as the ship was sailing into Livorno. It was such a neat feeling watching ourselves dock in a new country! We booked a tour through Tuscany with the above-mentioned people that we met in our roll call. What a wonderful day! The weather was great: Sunny and about 23 degrees. Our driver was awesome. He chatted easily and knew the area very well. We started with a short detour to Pisa, as this was the #1 thing DH wanted to see in the area. It was actually really neat. We drove through the country and saw more vines and olive trees then you can imagine: it's impossible to describe how beautiful it is up there! We had a wonderful lunch at a winery and were back at the ship after a long day, with plenty of time to spare!

 

We spent some time in the casino and wandering around the ship. There's so much entertainment that you get stopped in your tracks to just sit and pay attention for a while. It's a nice, leisurely way to spend an evening. We were stuffed from our late lunch and didn't feel like eating at dinner time, so we spent a while in the hot tubs (with weaker drinks). We met an interesting couple from Texas (I love explaining Canada to people! *lol*) and by the time we were hungry it was too late for the main dining rooms, so we made our way to O'Sheehan's. Yummy comfort food! It was the perfect late-night snack. The wings really are as good as everyone says, but DH was disappointed that the mozzarella stick serving was so tiny... but that's an easy fix: order more! It was another early night (there's a trend here: Europe is exhausting!) and we were off to bed to rest up before Rome!

 

Docking in Livorno. Taken as the Epic was doing a 360 in a VERY tight space. I was thoroughly impressed as I can't even parallel park!

 

 

The Winery where we had lunch and bought some AMAZING wine to bring home

[woody73]

 

. . . Finally I got up to investigate, had a "Holy Crap!" moment and called DH over to look out the balcony. Massive waves!

 

. . . At about 2:30pm we were walking through the buffet and there were dishes flying off the tables and counters, and people were walking in not-so-straight lines. We thought the whole thing was hilarious!

Enjoying your review!

 

 

We met an interesting couple from Texas (I love explaining Canada to people! *lol*) . . .

On one cruise, we knew someone from Canada who had to explain to someone from the U.S. that Canada is not a state. Hilarious.

 

Woody

[jaw070701]

What tour company did you use in Liverno? That trip sounds like what I would like to see. I'll be travelling with my elderly dad and want some sight seeing but at an easy pace. Thanks!

[ontheweb]

keep the review coming. We're doing our Epic western Mediterranean voyage in August to celebrate our 35th wedding anniversary. (It will be our 8th cruise, with our first having also been a Western Mediterranean for our 25th wedding anniversary.)

 

We especially want to hear about Florence.

[SuiteCruiser]

Thanks guys for the positive feedback! It's fun finally writing this!

 

Attila: We had heard about Barcelona before going, so we were wary about how we carried our things while we were there. We never had anything other then sweaters and water in the backpack. All of our important things were in my cross-body bag, which I always kept near my front. I'm sure I looked like a dork, but we didn't lose our stuff! Barcelona is a VERY beautiful city. It's clean, the people are nice, it's easy to get around and it's very lively! We never felt unsafe walking around at night. As long as you use your head, you'll be fine.

 

SuiteCruiser: It's so funny thinking that people from home would be so close by in the Mediterranean! I hope to sail the Epic again some day. We loved it so much!

 

We were on the Gem in January (will be agin March 11th) and did the Segway tour and the other family on the tour was from Kanata. :). I'm on the Epic in October doing the transatlantic :)

 

Look forward to the rest of your review!

[Sammae]

Jaw: we booked through Share a Shore Excursion. It was arranged through our Roll Call board. Very good experience!

 

ontheweb: We didn't go to Florence. From Livorno we did the above-mentioned tour. We'll have to go back around Italy again and see Florence... and many other things that we missed!

 

SuiteCruiser: We're on the Gem March 4th! Missed each other by a week! That would have been a huge coincidence! We're actually from Renfrew, but since no one knows where that is, we say Ottawa. Small world!

[Sammae]

Ok. I think I have this straight. I've been discussing with my husband to make sure I have the rest of our evenings straightened out. It's all such a blur now of amazing food and good entertainment! Poor us.

 

Day 3 was another early, and long day! We arrived in Civitavecchia and met up with the crew from the day before to catch the train into Rome together. We bought our tickets outside the port, which give you a round-trip to Rome, and all day transit within Rome for a very good price... let's say 13 Euro, since I don't quite remember. The train station was an easy walk from port and the ride was about an hour into Rome.

 

Prior to leaving for Europe, we purchased our tickets for the Colosseum online. This was a great idea! Once off the train, we broke into 3 groups, as we all had our own plans for the day and Steve and I wandered our way towards the Colosseum using our handy pocket map. We decided we were going to walk everywhere we went in Rome, since that was the best way to see the city, walking through side streets and such.

 

At the Colosseum the line-up was HUGE! But since we purchased our tickets in advance, we entered to the left of the lineup and walked straight in! Go us! This was one of our favourite parts of our vacation! We had downloaded the Rick Steves audio tour podcasts for Rome, which come with printable maps to help you follow along. This was a great way to do it! We were able to do it at our own pace which was wonderful.

 

We also went to the Roman Forum (eh), the Pantheon (very cool), and the Trevi fountain (it's... a fountain). By that time we were pooped and only had about an hour left, so we started to make our way back to the train station. I'd say that anyone who wants to do Ancient Rome AND the Vatican in the same day should re-think. It was exhausting just doing half that. As we made our way back to the train station it was common for one of us to go "Oh look. More ruins." or "Oh look. Another pretty fountain." How can one city be so awesome!? Rome is yet another place we'll have to go back to, to get the rest of the experience!

 

After getting of the train back in Civitavecchia, we started making our way back to the ship, and ran into everyone from our crew! This is why the roll call was very cool for us. It was nice having fast friends that we could run into and share our daily experiences with!

 

We went to the Cirque Dreams and Dinner this evening. We waited in line for the non-premium tickets we bought, as we’d heard that going up to the top to watch were some of the best seats in house. Well, we asked to be seated up there, where there was only 1 person currently sitting and got a “No.” Turns out this 1 person was reserving the ENTIRE UPPER LEVEL for his “family”. The rest of them showed up about 3 minutes before show time. We were not impressed. We sat in a booth around the outside of the lower ring. The view was still good. It seems there really isn’t a bad seat in the house. The service was only ok, but that must have a lot to do with trying to serve dinner to that many people, all at the same time and within a strict time limit. The food was better then I’d expected after reading so many less-then-stellar reviews of it. Great show! We’d see it again.

[Sammae]

View of the Epic docked in Civitavecchia

 

This was on the train platform. Especially awesome coming from a place where liquor can only be bought in the government-owned stores!

[Sammae]

Day 4

Today we docked in Naples. I’ll be blunt: Naples sucked. You would have to PAY me to got back to Naples… and it’d have to be the right amount of money. We were bombarded by sketchy drivers offering their services as soon as we left the port. Then we headed across the street to buy our transit/train pass. The traffic is insane. These are angry drivers. Like, for giggles, the’ll pretend to run you over as you’re crossing on a walk sign. Har Har. So we bought our tickets at the newspaper stand and went back across the street to catch the Tram. We were worried about knowing when to get off at the train station, but this was a very easy thing to figure out! The tram ride was our only positive Naples experience. The train station was gross. The train was grosser. I, unfortunately had to use the restroom in the train station. Apparently the men’s was worse because it was just a hole in the floor. Bah. But enough about Naples. I’m sure some people explore it and love it, but on the outside, it’s yucky.

 

We’re on to Pompeii!!! We LOVED Pompeii! We did another Rick Steves tour. It was great! It was one of those mind-blowing experiences in life, walking through a ghost town from 2000 years ago. We spent three hours here, then caught the train to go further down the line to Sorrento.

 

Sorrento is absolutely beautiful. I could totally vacation on the Amalfi coast. There’s so much more of it to explore! We had lunch at a restaurant overlooking the coast line, way up high. There was lots of shopping to be done, if I’d had the energy. We stopped at a grocery on our way back to the train and grabbed a bottle of vodka for Steve, as his Rye had run out. We split it between our two water bottles to be clever and get it on board. We also bought a few bottles of wine, some Lemoncello, and some 7Up. We planned to drop the liquor at the table on our way in. It was just stuff we wanted to bring home with us. We got back to the ship in 1 piece without being eaten by Naples. We through our bags through the x-ray, I picked up the shopping bag of booze and we started walking back into the ship. I was on the look-out for the liquor check table… and it wasn’t there! Next thing we knew, we were in the casino, and I still had an armful of wine and lemoncello! RUN!! Cruising lesson number 1 was learned that evening: bring a wine opener. We had to persuade one of the waiters to open a bottle for us because it didn’t have the label on it saying corkage was paid.

 

We had dinner at O’Sheehan’s, where I tried my first ever tuna melt. Just to see what the fuss was about. It tasted like childhood. Yummy. Afterwards, we made our way up to Spice H2O, where a band was playing. We ran into Billy and Jen up there and spent the rest of the evening with them. It was a good time!

 

The entrance to Pompeii!

 

Naples is Beautiful at dusk (just not up close!). I love this picture so much I had it made into a poster and framed!

 

This is the ship being refuelled! Was very cool to watch the guys working on the barge!

 

Our view eating lunch in Sorrento

 

The best towel animal of the trip! He looks a little evil, but he was pretty chill.

[SuiteCruiser]

Jaw: we booked through Share a Shore Excursion. It was arranged through our Roll Call board. Very good experience!

 

ontheweb: We didn't go to Florence. From Livorno we did the above-mentioned tour. We'll have to go back around Italy again and see Florence... and many other things that we missed!

 

SuiteCruiser: We're on the Gem March 4th! Missed each other by a week! That would have been a huge coincidence! We're actually from Renfrew, but since no one knows where that is, we say Ottawa. Small world!

 

Keep her beautiful for us :)

 

If you were planning on driving, Amtrak has a great deal from Syracuse, it's only 5.5 hours to Penn Staion, which is about the same time it takes to drive. It's very relaxing with a dining car and you also don't have to pay to park in NYC. We're doing that again this upcoming trip. I think it was 56 dollars each round trip.

[sdmike]

Since I've never been to the cities you visited I'm really enjoying this review. Thank you!

[ontheweb]

Oh well, I guess we're not going to hear about Florence. We missed it on our earlier cruise because I got us on the wrong train, going the wrong way.

 

My DW is an art teacher (in fact the world's best elementary art teacher <G>), so getting to Florence is our #1 goal on this cruise.

 

So far no one else is going from the roll call I started. I know about setting up a tour from a roll call since I did that for St. Petersburg on a Baltic cruise for our 30th anniversary.

[Sammae]

Day 5

FINALLY! A sea day! We were absolutely exhausted from the last three days in port and were very ready for some R&R. We started the day out with room service breakfast on our balcony. It was nice and sunny out, but very windy. After breakfast, we headed up to the pool deck for some lounge time. It was packed! We managed to find some chairs on the level right below the freestyle deck and got ourselves a bucket of beer (one of several that we consumed over the course of the week). We didn’t end up swimming at all over the course of the week because it was always chilly enough that we weren’t interested. We had lunch from the buffet that we ate at our lounge chairs. We spent the rest of the afternoon napping/reading in our room with the balcony door open. Great, relaxing day! Dinner was at Cagney’s and it was absolutely delicious! We went to see Steven Sorption at the late show after dinner and it was a good show. He was funny and was very good at interacting with the audience.

 

Day 6

We docked in Palma de Mallorca on Day 6. It was pouring rain when we woke up. This should sound like a real bummer, but we were actually relieved that we had an excuse to laze around for another day! It would have been nice to get off and see the island, but being able to take it easy is also an important part of a vacation! Amazingly, tonnes of people still left the boat (did I mention it was POURING?) so we had lots of space to stretch out! We had breakfast in O’Sheehan’s which was very good. We decided that we were going to take video tours of all of the common areas of the ship, and of our stateroom. It was a great time to do it without the crowds. I’ll post links to these below.

 

Mid-afternoon the rain stopped for a bit and it was warm and humid. We grabbed our bathing suits and headed to the water slides! No line ups! We did the huge slide which was a really good time. I thought I was never going to stop spinning around! We made sure to finish spending our casino slot play coupons and I used my winnings to buy myself a new watch. We had reservations at Le Bistro for dinner.

 

The saddest thing happened at this point in our trip: we had actually eaten so much food over the course of the week that we weren’t hungry! It was awful. The food tasted so amazing, and we could hardly eat a bite of it. Such a waste. On our next cruise, we will be eating in Le Bistro again and not eating for the entire day before hand so we can enjoy every bite of it! I think this would have been our favorite specialty restaurant.

 

After dinner it was time to pack. This was the worst part of our vacation. I didn’t want to leave! We made sure to purchase a future cruise credit so we’d have a good excuse to take another vacation soon. We also made our way down to the photo lounge to purchase a few of our formal pictures from the week.

 

Day 7

 

We arrived in Barcelona bright and early (well, it was dark out still). We took our time getting up and ready, as we weren’t flying out until the next day. Steve headed up to the pool deck to collect the wine we had checked early in the week. He said there were no lines and it was a breeze to pick it up. We opted to carry our own luggage off, so we headed up to the pool deck with it to grab a quick bite before leaving the ship. Then it was goodbye! We certainly hope to sail on the Epic again some day. 1 week is certainly not enough to see and do everything there is on board. What a wonderful week!

 

O'Sheehan's bowling

 

Pools at night

[Still Dreaming]

Great review!! I am so glad that we decided to go on the 12 day grand med. Hopefully it won't go by so fast.

[Sammae]

Things We Should Have Packed

- Bottle opener

- Corkscrew

- Tums and non-drowsy Gravol

 

Things We Packed and Were Thankful For

- Hanging accessory and makeup organizer

- Power bar

- Casino slot play 2 for 1 credits

- Warm clothes

- Lots of books for when I just needed to unwind

- A really good camera

 

Other Interesting Observations

- Barcelona is not nearly as scary as people make it sound. Just be smart!

- They let us bring liquor/wine on board after Livorno with no questions

- Buckets of beer are a good deal since you can bring it back to your room to drink as you please

- There is a such thing as too much really, really good food

- The room stewards on our floor were a blast! Very friendly gentlemen who remembered our names and chatted/joked with us every day.

- We loved having a balcony! We don't get to the sea very often and that was part of the fun of this vacation. The sound of the waves at night was wonderful.

- Those pressure bracelets may have saved our stomachs if we'd have them. I'm going to try them on our next cruise in March

- The people on board were great, for the most part. We met lots of interesting, friendly people throughout the week who were eager to share stories about their experiences.

- Don't try to do everything. Some of these ports of call would require 3-4 days to see and do everything we wanted to. The ship would have required us to either never sleep, or to spend another 2 weeks on board!

- I wish I'd done more of the activities from the dailies. I'm going to make an effort to do this on the Gem

 

Most of all, go into it with a positive attitude! Little things happen that some people make a big deal out of, but in the grand scheme, you're on vacation! Have fun!!

 

If anyone has questions you think I might be able to answer, go for it!