Scenic Sapphire Spectacular south of France departing Lyon, June 14 2022

[English Tim]

Originally my wife and I were booked on scenic to travel on the Douro river in Portugal, but as were able to book a last minute trip on this cruise, last October, we changed it to the river Rhône this June.

 

We have booked a junior suite, which gives us a little more room, some pressing  of clothes and a wine pairing dinner on one evening, which we particularly enjoyed last year.

 

We also upgraded our flights to Club, which gives us more room, particularly as we are able to book front seats free of additional charge. As Scenic provide airport transfers we are able to relax and drink champagne 🥂 

 

At Lyon we’ll buy 24 hour visitor passes, which include airport travel, travel around the city and entry to some attractions.

 

We have booked one night in Lyon, at Hotel des Artistes, as we like to relax not worrying about arriving late flights, etc. The hotel is centrally situated and very close to the cruise port.

 

We are fully vaccinated and have to prove this at airport check-in, along with completing passenger locator forms prior to arrival.

[Mrs Miggins]

Hope you have a great time.  Looking forward to your reports especially about the trips.  On our Azamara cruise in April we revisited Les Baux and the Carriers des Lumieres.  The exhibition showed wonderful images of Venice on the huge walls of the Caves.  We had been before but a second visit was still wonderful.  I know Scenic offer a similar excursion.  If you haven't been its certainly a fabulous experience.  Les Baux is also a lovely hilltop village complete with interesting little churches and a great hilltop fort.  Our trip also included St Remy, also a lovely town but I am not sure what the Scenic offering includes.

Hope you both have a lovely time.

 

 

 

Edited June 11, 2022 by Mrs Miggins

[Canal archive]

Here it is English Tim. Enjoy yourself lovely part of the world and the French are super they get better the further south you travel. There’s a particular cafe/bar in Arles where the proprietor is determined to practice his English we spent a super hour there during a flash storm.

[loriva]

Thanks, English Tim, for starting this thread.

 

You'll be starting your cruise one day before we start our cruisetour with Scenic.  We actually step onboard a Scenic ship (scheduled to be the Jade) on 22 June, so will be looking forward to hearing insights from one who has cruised with Scenic before the pandemic and now as your time permits. 

 

Hope you have a wonderful cruise!

 

[Fouremco]

Looking forward to reading all of your posts. I hope that you have a super cruise.

[pete_coach]

We will be getting onboard Sapphire on 21 July from Nice to Lyon.

Thing is for us, although it says starting at Nice, the ship is actually at Tarascon. We cannot get hold of anyone at Scenic to tell us where to meet a bus to get to Tarascon from Nice.

We are getting to Nice a few days early to visit Cote d Azur and have booked our hotel already.

Anyone have any idea where we meet Scenic in Nice?

[Canal archive]

If you look at the, I think there called stickies, at the top of the page it lists the contact details for Sapphire, also you have more than a month before your cruise I doubt you’ll hear anything at least for a couple of weeks.

[English Tim]

We have now been able to check in for our flights and we leave Heathrow tomorrow afternoon. Scenic chauffeur company called us to arrange our collection. They are allowing what should be plenty of time.

 

 

[Canal archive]

Each time we’ve been driven by ‘Tristar’ they’ve never let us down even picking us up at silly o’clock, for Bristol, Heathrow and Paddington okay we’re in Wiltshire a little nearer to the M4 than Dorchester. Always comfortable car's.

[Inthebubble]

21 hours ago, pete_coach said:

We will be getting onboard Sapphire on 21 July from Nice to Lyon.

Thing is for us, although it says starting at Nice, the ship is actually at Tarascon. We cannot get hold of anyone at Scenic to tell us where to meet a bus to get to Tarascon from Nice.

We are getting to Nice a few days early to visit Cote d Azur and have booked our hotel already.

Anyone have any idea where we meet Scenic in Nice?

We sailed this lovely trip in 2019, arrived early in Nice and stayed at the hotel Scenic uses.  We and others were picked up at the hotel and taken by luxury bus to Tarascon, a drive of a couple of hours.  If you aren't staying at "their" hotel, you will need to contact Scenic to find out where they are picking up passengers in Nice and let them know you will meet them there.  They don't seem keen to pick guests up at other locations, which is understandable.

[English Tim]

5 minutes ago, Canal archive said:

Each time we’ve been driven by ‘Tristar’ they’ve never let us down even picking us up at silly o’clock, for Bristol, Heathrow and Paddington okay we’re in Wiltshire a little nearer to the M4 than Dorchester. Always comfortable car's.

We are being picked up by Addison Lee, who may have taken over Tristar. It is usually a Mercedes E class and as we are about to become platinum we don’t pay any excess mileage, which saves us about £100 each way.

[Canal archive]

Yup also platinum so useful! Also Addlee has taken over Tristar.

[notamermaid]

2 hours ago, English Tim said:

We have now been able to check in for our flights and we leave Heathrow tomorrow afternoon. Scenic chauffeur company called us to arrange our collection. They are allowing what should be plenty of time.

 

 

Have a great cruise. It looks as if it is going to be hot in Europe this week. Not sure about the South of France but our temperatures along the Rhine may be over 30 Celsius.

 

notamermaid

 

Edited June 12, 2022 by notamermaid

[pete_coach]

4 hours ago, Inthebubble said:

We sailed this lovely trip in 2019, arrived early in Nice and stayed at the hotel Scenic uses.  We and others were picked up at the hotel and taken by luxury bus to Tarascon, a drive of a couple of hours.  If you aren't staying at "their" hotel, you will need to contact Scenic to find out where they are picking up passengers in Nice and let them know you will meet them there.  They don't seem keen to pick guests up at other locations, which is understandable.

Thanks for that. Would have no problem going to the hotel to get picked up.

We did that in Budapest. Scenic used Marriott for 250 euros per night and we stayed around the corner at a great place for 100 euros per night.

The thing is, in previous emails, Scenic said they do not have a hotel in Nice. They said they may meet at the airport. Guess I will have to call and be on hold for hours to find out if anything is new. They are not answering emails.

[Host Jazzbeau]

2 hours ago, pete_coach said:

Thanks for that. Would have no problem going to the hotel to get picked up.

We did that in Budapest. Scenic used Marriott for 250 euros per night and we stayed around the corner at a great place for 100 euros per night.

The thing is, in previous emails, Scenic said they do not have a hotel in Nice. They said they may meet at the airport. Guess I will have to call and be on hold for hours to find out if anything is new. They are not answering emails.

The people you are calling may not know.  The ship will know – close to your sailing.

[English Tim]

• Picked up on time and trouble free drive to the airport. Very quickly through security and into lounge. As we have plenty of time, we have decided to do a lounge crawl, to try different champagnes.

[Canal archive]

Oh well done it’s a pity no choice at breakfast on Scenic we just have to put up with Veuve Clicquot oh dear what a pity never mind! Raise a Bucks Fizz to all.

[English Tim]

We are now on board, but the ship was at a different place than we expected. It is burst on the Saone near Confluence. 
 

We stayed last night at Hotel des Artistes near Place Bellacour, in the centre.

 

We bought 24 hour Lyon city tickets, which include the Rhône airport express.

 

The ship is beautiful.

[pete_coach]

On 6/12/2022 at 7:10 PM, Host Jazzbeau said:

The people you are calling may not know.  The ship will know – close to your sailing.

Would the ship know what hotel Scenic is suggesting?

Would the ship know where and when the pickup point is?

[Canal archive]

I wouldn’t be surprised I certainly hope you are.

[Canal archive]

English Tim the hotel looks just as I like them just a bit quirky.

[Host Jazzbeau]

1 hour ago, pete_coach said:

Would the ship know what hotel Scenic is suggesting?

Would the ship know where and when the pickup point is?

They would have to, wouldn't they?  I assume that the CD on the ship will be the person making all the transfer arrangements.

[need2travel1]

English Tim,

Have a great time!  Enjoying following along.....

[English Tim]

On 6/14/2022 at 4:37 PM, Canal archive said:

English Tim the hotel looks just as I like them just a bit quirky.

It was very comfortable with a hot powerful shower. The loo was very small, so it needed some agility!

 

The ship is very comfortable and about 60% capacity.

 

I don’t think the ship’s  Internet is good enough to upload photos, so they will have to wait until we get home.

 

The ship wifi isn’t very good, so having trouble posting.

June 16

The weather is getting hotter and apparently heatwave is on its way from Africa!

 

Today we are at Chalon sur Saone, which is very pretty. Rosy has gone on a wine tasting but I preferred to explore on an electric bike, which was fun. I also enjoy the session in the gym the salt room, which is supposed to be cleansing.

 

This afternoon we’ll be cruising, so the hydrotherapy pool beckons.

 

The photos seem to be uploading today, which may be because I’m sitting in reception.

 

 

 

[Canal archive]

Oh memories of 2019
ohh memories.

Edited June 16, 2022 by Canal archive