Worried about having sufficient spending money..

[JM-1972]

We had a fabulous cruise and did not spend excessively. As we don't like organised excursions we did all the Ports DIY. I love to research everything.

 

We did Barcelona using the metro - 11.50 Euros for 5 trips

 

We took the Train to Rome - 9.50pp for return rail ticket and use of metro, a lot of Rome you can do on foot. We did have a beautiful meal with wine in Rome near the Trevi fountain but there were vendors selling slices of pizza for E2.50.

 

Monte Carlo - we used a hop on hop off bus and visited the Ocean museum - avoid the bus it was not very good and there is a trolley train at the museum for E7.00pp or most of it is walkable. The museum is not very expensive or entrance to the palace.

 

See Toms port guides they were a great help for my planning and Ron in Rome.

 

Hope this helps.

[Redstar46]

Another tip for you, have bought a couple of photos from the ships photographers, we then useing our phones took pictures of our pictures in the photo place, on returning home we then from our phones could email our pictures to photo box (online photo processers) and have them developed and sent to us for 5p a copy!

[LibraLass41]

I was going to mention Rome and Florence/Pisa, both these places are quite far away from the port with no free shuttles - to get the most of these ports you need to think about how you are going to get there and see as much as possible....

 

We did tours and had a fantastic time seeing all the main sights, had never been there before, and 'when in Rome' as they say you just have to go see it all...Trevi Fountain, Vatican, Colleusseum etc.. we did tours @ £100 EACH with lunch...yes you can go by train...but remember the ship won't wait for you if you don't get back from this hot busy city in time..so allow plenty of time to return, personally i prefer trouble free/stress free tours. There is a cheap tour 'Rome on your own' which is just an escourted coach there and back (and its over 1hr each way), I would take that if watching the £'s and at Florence too.

- Escourted tours also queue jump the massive queues of tourists queueing in the hot sun, for Vatican, St Peters etc etc and well worth doing if you actually want to see something, otherwise you could end up spending precious time in a queue !!

[JM-1972]

I was going to mention Rome and Florence/Pisa, both these places are quite far away from the port with no free shuttles - to get the most of these ports you need to think about how you are going to get there and see as much as possible....

 

We did tours and had a fantastic time seeing all the main sights, had never been there before, and 'when in Rome' as they say you just have to go see it all...Trevi Fountain, Vatican, Colleusseum etc.. we did tours @ £100 EACH with lunch...yes you can go by train...but remember the ship won't wait for you if you don't get back from this hot busy city in time..so allow plenty of time to return, personally i prefer trouble free/stress free tours. There is a cheap tour 'Rome on your own' which is just an escourted coach there and back (and its over 1hr each way), I would take that if watching the £'s and at Florence too.

- Escourted tours also queue jump the massive queues of tourists queueing in the hot sun, for Vatican, St Peters etc etc and well worth doing if you actually want to see something, otherwise you could end up spending precious time in a queue !!

 

I agree with above posters comments, although we did all the ports DIY mainly because I don't like travelling in a coach for more than 45 minutes, you do have to have done your homework and I always make sure we are back in plenty of time. We made sure that no train strikes were forecast which is important to check. We don't like long days and by 2.30 our kids were complaining of the heat in Rome and we headed back . We did manage to see everything we wanted to see apart from St Peters. We bought tickets in advance for the collosseum/vatican museums etc online which meant we could skip the lines as above poster states you will waste precious time in queues otherwise.

[southwinds]

If you must contact home via the internet get them on the P&O site ... and create a group with you and them in it or show them how to message you and you can keep in touch that way for free...

The free water bottle you get first day KEEP IT and top it up in the self serve to take ashore each port day...and take the biscutes in case you get peckish:(

 

We take squash to add to tap water.... which is drinkable !!