Meditteranean Questions..

[MrsFixitCT]

DH and I are ***toying*** with the idea of cruising the Med...and we have questions...

 

• What time of year is best?
  
• Are there times of year we need to avoid? We're DINKS-double income/no kids...I have nothing "against" kids, but prefer not to be overloaded with them either...
  
• We've never been to Europe..any itineraries that will give us "the biggest bang for the buck"? This may very well be our one shot at this-so I'd want to see as much as possible...
  
• Is packing for a Med cruise really any different from a Caribbean one? We tend to be "jeans/shorts and T-shirt people" for the days, and appropriate formal wear for night-any huge differences in what's "acceptable" in Europe vs the Caribbean?
  

 

As I indicated, we're just thinking about this. There's also the thought of trying to schedule a back to back of some sort, but with 2 itineraries...like England, etc., and then the actual Med...has anyone done that?

 

Thanks in advance!

[bbuchanan]

We did one in the Spring; late April into early May and the other in late August early September. Being outside the traditional school year calendar resulted in fewer kids on board. Still children (I can still hear Marco...Polo), but fewer! I understand Oceania usually sails with fewer children since they have no formal youth programs.

[jbond]

We've sailed the Med three times and the Baltic once. All were exceptional cruises. We have the British Isles and Norwegian Fjords booked for June this year.

We've sailed the Med Sept/October time frame to stay away from the summer heat. We got a lot of rain this past year, late October, but it didn't spoil our enjoyment. We sailed the Baltic in July and the weather was great.

We have never seen too many kids on all four cruises. In fact hardly any.

Which itinerary? Depends on what you want, they're all great. If I had to choose one, I'd probably pick the Brilliance cruise we did in 2004. Barcelona round trip, visiting France, Italy and the Greek Isles.

Clothes? Very different to the Caribbean during the day. If you want to visit churches and museums, shorts are a very definite NO NO in Spain, France and Italy. Greece was more tolerant of shorts. In the Scandinavian countries we found shorts to be no problem. In the evening it was just like any other cruise.

We have some albums posted at http://community.webshots.com/user/jbond105/2

Check under Brilliance of the Seas Mediterranean and Baltic.

[plarimer]

We circled the UK in 2001 and loved it. We went in mid-June and there were very few children. Round trip out of Harwich - Paris, Plymouth, Dublin, Glasgow, Cobb, Bergen, Flam, Fjords, and Amsterdam - 12 Days. It was an awesome trip and I would do it again in a heartbeat. It does require care in packing because it was warm in England, France, and Holland, but a bit chilly in Scotland and Norway.

 

In 2004 we did a 12 day Med. cruise out of Barcelona in late June and loved it, too! Exceptional warm weather and perfect for a balcony cabin if you can afford it. I would highly recommend it. Barcelona, Nice, Florence, Rome, Scicily, Naples, Athens, Santorini, and Myconos. In Nice we added Monte Carlo as a place to visit. We loved seeing active volcanos as we sailed by and feeling the warm breezes. We are headed back there this summer to add Venice and Ephesus, Turkey to our list of places to see. Very few children were onboard as this was a port intensive vacation.

 

Adding a pre-cruise city is also helpful to get over your jet lag so that you can see more places when your ship arrives.

 

The best thing is that you are seeing a multitude of countries and cultures and you only have to unpack once!

 

I hope you choose to go to Europe, because it is a chance of a lifetime.