Short review Constellation, Venice to Rome

[Vineyardfan]

 

After disembarking Constellation this morning, my wife wrote a quick review. She’s having trouble getting it posted here, so here it is from my account instead:

 

Here’s a short review about our cruise in the Mediterranean. We are a scandinavian couple in our mid thirties and early forties. We just finished our cruise and are sitting in the airport. It was a great cruise and have a post cruise depression already...;) We like Celebrity, 10 + cruises on Celebrity but have tried Royal, Oceania, MSC and Carnival too. We have done many cruises in the Mediterranean and are used to doing things on our own and use the public transportation (or walk!)

 

We stayed two nights in Venice pre cruise. It was a budget alternative, bed and breakfast Dalla Mora 166 euros for two nights. Adequate, good location and friendly staff. We would recommend to others. Good value for money but quite basic! Easy to get to the port from Dalla Mora. Couple of bridges and then the people mover to port. 

 

We had two dinners in Venice, first one, a more old-fashioned place was called Osteria alla Bifora. Classic venetian food, no frills but good. Located in a square with loads of students hanging out as it’s just around the corner from the university. No need to make reservations here. 

 

Second one was Estro. Delicious, modern food and great tasting menu! They have a huge wine list and are more than happy to pair local wines by the glass with the dishes. 

 

We also tried couple of cicchetti bars. Please try a cicchetti and a glass of local wine. Great way to feel more local life. Venice is very touristic so you need to search for the more local spots.

 

Ports

 

Koper- We took the local bus to Piran and Portoroz. Beautiful towns and nice walk by the sea. Very easy to do on your own. Koper is a small city, you only need an hour or two to walk around.

 

Rijeka - We just walked around. Nice little town and easy to get to from the port. The walk up to the castle is well worth the effort, with lovely views from the top. Free entry to the castle. 

 

Dubrovnik - We hiked from the port up to the Imperial fortress (took us around 1 hour and 20-30 minutes from the port to the top, but we’re reasonably fit) and then down to the old town. A refreshing drink at the Buza bar in old town with lovely view. Local bus back to port. Really easy and inexpensive, 1.20 euros. No need for cruise shuttle for 12 euros.

 

Kotor- Our fellow cruise critic member Pooja (thank you!) arranged a very nice boat excursion in Kotor. Early morning and beautiful views when sitting in a boat and seeing the sights like Perast, Lady Rock and the caves. Cost was 36 euros per person. 

 

Malta- My husband went scuba diving. It was wreckdiving. The company is called Dive Systems Malta and the cost for the day was round 130 e with transfer (and nitrox) included. He enjoyed it a lot and recommends the company to others. I took a long walk in Valetta. Lovely city.

 

Catania - Our favourite. Such a nice city with interesting buzzling market and local delicacies. We wandered round in the city and had great time. Don’t miss it!

 

Naples -We have been in Napoli many times. This time we wandered round and ate lunch at the Gino e Toto Sorbillo pizzeria. Such an experience! One hour wait to get a table but so worth it! Once ordered, the pizzas arrived in just a few minutes. It is one of the best pizza restaurants in Neaples. Two pizzas, wine, water and a small dessert cost us 30 euros for two. Nothing fancy but so delicious. 

 

Airport transfer- We arranged a transfer to the airport through roll call. 130 euros for 6 people. Company is called Elegant taxi. Very easy to use! 

 

The ship, food and entertainment. 

 

Constellation is a well kept ship. We didn’t notice much wear and tear. It doesn’t have the same restaurant alternatives as S-class ships do, so we skipped the specialty restaurants this time. We actually ate all the dinners in MDR and had great meals every night. Service was good. We ate at different sections with different waiters. Service was a bit slow sometimes but mostly good - some evenings all the guests seem to arrive at the same time and then the waiters and other staff had a hard time coping. Sommeliers were mostly good. We had the classic package and found the wine choices decent. Food was at good quality and we found it a be a bit better than last time. 

 

We ate breakfast at Aqua spa cafe every morning. Calmer experience and you could get greek yoghurt and fresh berries with your musli. Delicious! Very good healthier energy bars at breakfast. Nice to skip the Oceanview and have a quieter breakfast.

 

Entertainment - Very good! A lot of music everywhere. Shows were good and we specielly enjoyed Miss Connolly (spelling?) who was a finalist in UK Voice. Beautiful voice! Cruise director Alejandro had great dance classes by the pool. Fun to watch! 

 

All in all, enjoyable cruise and good value (found a good deal!) Celebrity continues to deliver great product for a good price. We have noticed some cutbacks (less staff in mdr and bars) but still find Celebrity good value if you find a good deal. M-class ships often have good offers on oceanview staterooms. We have enjoyed our last couple of cruises in oceanview cabins too and noticed that it is a good value for money. 

 

If you have any comments or questions we will be happy to answer. 

[colingu]

We are doing a similar cruise shortly. Did you have select or traditional dining? Was their any wait for a table in the MDR? We usually do select dining but are considering traditional late dining at 845pm but have heard that select dining is now overrsubscribed and busy. Any thoughts?

[Vineyardfan]

We did select dining, and always prefer a table for 2. Jacklin, the maitre d’, did an amazing job getting us a table quickly even when they where very busy. 

 

We are happy sitting in different sections on different nights, so I think that might’ve made it easier to find a table quickly for us. On 1 night of the 11 we had to wait and were given a pager (about 20 minutes waiting), but I believe that other parties might have had longer waits on some nights. 

 

The busiest period on our on our cruise was between 7:15 and 8:15, before and after that there was rarely any waiting time for anyone as far as we could tell. 

[davekathy]

Thank you for taking us along on your cruise. 

[KJMommy04]

Thank you for your review! We will be on this sailing in a couple of weeks. In Dubrovnik, was the bus easy to use? Where are the bus stops in relation to the Pile Gate and the port? Did you need to pay in Kuna?

[Lastdance]

5 minutes ago, KJMommy04 said:

Thank you for your review! We will be on this sailing in a couple of weeks. In Dubrovnik, was the bus easy to use? Where are the bus stops in relation to the Pile Gate and the port? Did you need to pay in Kuna?

 

 

Last time we were there we used Euros!   Hope it is the same, as I will be there again next May.

[realnice46]

3 hours ago, KJMommy04 said:

Thank you for your review! We will be on this sailing in a couple of weeks. In Dubrovnik, was the bus easy to use? Where are the bus stops in relation to the Pile Gate and the port? Did you need to pay in Kuna?

The bus lets you off right in front of gate. One of our favorite ports. Love Buza bar for the views and if you’re there late enough the sunset is incredible. Most places take credit cards but some of the small shops, like ice cream or little markets only take kunas. There is an ATM right outside the gate. We just got a few and with what little we had left bought a couple bottles of water. I think at the time it was 6 kunas to 1 US dollar?

[portofrome]

Thanks for your review!

[vickykay]

Do you recall the name of the company used in Kotor?

 

thanks!

[TeeRick]

Thanks for your review.  We sailed Connie two years ago out of Venice and had a wonderful time.  Our only occasional complaint was slow bar service.  How was it for your cruise?

[Vineyardfan]

4 hours ago, TeeRick said:

Thanks for your review.  We sailed Connie two years ago out of Venice and had a wonderful time.  Our only occasional complaint was slow bar service.  How was it for your cruise?

The martini bar was quite crowded most nights (more so than our previous cruises on the M class), so we ended up sitting at the tables along the “aisle” (corridor?), but service was very quick for us. One of the waiters for the tables learned our drink preference about halfway through the cruise and then always asked if we wanted our usual. 

 

Service at the pool and top deck bars were very quick throughout. 

[Vineyardfan]

6 hours ago, vickykay said:

Do you recall the name of the company used in Kotor?

 

thanks!

The company was called “Kotor boat tours”, they leave from park Slobode, directly to the north of where the tenders dock, just a few minutes away. There is at least three different tour operators next to each other there, and they all seemed happy to accommodate walk-ins as well when we were there. 

[Vineyardfan]

18 hours ago, KJMommy04 said:

Thank you for your review! We will be on this sailing in a couple of weeks. In Dubrovnik, was the bus easy to use? Where are the bus stops in relation to the Pile Gate and the port? Did you need to pay in Kuna?

We walked into town and took the bus back - the bus station is just outside the Pile Gate. There were about four(?) different bus lines running back to the port, but with quite good signs in english. 

 

Price was 12 kunas if you bought tickets in the little kiosk, 15 onboard the bus. 

 

The bus bus stop for the port was the main bus terminal, “Autobusni Kolodvor”, just 50 or 100 meters from the ship. 

[4Mast]

Good quick review.  We will be on Connie later this year and am looking forward to it. 

[Provence55always]

Thank you for review. We will be sailing from Singapore to Dubai next January so we are delighted to hear Connie is still in good condition. We always found the staff on board Connie very friendly as all Celebrity ships😉. We booked our flights today and 3 nights in Singapore before cruise. Now just hoping price comes down and we can upgrade our cabin!!