costa victoria review 24th nov part 2.

[seabourndt]

DAY 1 WED 24TH NOV.

found my cabin 10303 balcony cabin on deck 10. very nice cabin and balcony. after finding my luggage inside i decided to unpack, the talk on excursions had already started. at 5.30pm the lifeboat drill, not too long just had the usuual 5 languages telling us where to go in an emergency. no passenger check, we started moving just as it was finishing.

i had my table for dinner in fantasia not checking what sitting it was for. casual after calling reception. it was in the program but not where dinner was but next to the shows. i went down to dinner in casuals at 6.45pm. i then found out i was on 2nd sitting, after i had asked for 1st! as i had not had any lunch i was not waiting till 9pm for my dinner. so back to my cabin i went after checking a table in the alternative restaurant for 7.30pm. it was formal up there, not sure why as i sat on my own, there was only 1 other couple there. the food was fantastic i must say. so much more choice. i had cuttlefish,a bit tough,ravioli,cockeral and veg(small portions) the meat was lovely,a white chocolate cake that was out of this world. after a lovely dinner i went to see the show. it was great as all of them were.went to the corcorde plaza where i had good evenings 8 years ago but was dissapointed that the group then were much better then. also upstairs there was no bar staff to serve you, so i keft. i went to the tour desk to book some excursions. lokked at herculanam but was told poppei was better as i had not done it. and booked 2 excursions in tumisia too. sat outside in my balcony after having some brandy and a cigar. there was a nice mini bar the prices were not too bad. the minitures were not worth it tough. i'm glad i hadbrought a few drinks with me.

 

DAY 2. THU 25TH NOV.

today we would not be arriving in naples until 1pm. so i had a continental breakfast in my cabin. i had a letter from the tour office, the herculanam tour had been cancelled due to not enough people booking! strange as i had booked the poppei on? so i went to the tour desk to change it to pompei and got my paper ticket. after lunch boarded the coach to pompei in a mini bus as there were very few english had a few french to fill it up. the ruins were imense i did not realise how big it was. there was a lot of walking there,talked to a couple of men on there own too. that was when i found out that most of the english were travel agents. there were an american couple on the tour with 2 youngsters that were not interested one little bit and an even young little girl all she did was cry the whole time. it was a little off putting trying to listen to the tour guide whist she was bawling her head off.

returned to the town before getting back on the bus to the ship. on arrival,i had a look at the shops on the pier in naples. there were some lovely postcards in the shop of every ship thats been to naples. i thought they were for sale, but they were the owners private collection-shame!

i bought yet another phonecard, as the i bought in england did'nt work in italy.it would only work in italy, unfortunatly my mother was out so i could'nt call her. so i would have to wait until we returned to italy. after buying some lovely souvenir lighters. i've never seemn so many unusual ones, matchsticks,skittles and rifles among others. i went through the security and joined the queue to get back on the ship. i've never seen so many people trying to get on a ship in my life! after about 40mins i finally got on board the ship. i found later why the queue was so slow; unlike most other cruise lines they don't take a picture of passengers, so we all had to show our cruise cards as well as our passports! it was lucky i had brought mine as i thought it was for non e.c people. i had 1st sitting dinner, after still not got my new table number. i had to wait while the maitre d found me a table. first i had a table of 6 to myself then sat with jon another solo passenger. another negative was not tap water but having to pay for bottled mineral water. after dinner watched another great show. had a look at the cigar bar, found they had quite a choice, they were quite dear though, 9$ plus a margerrite.

 

DAY 2 NOV 25TH.

today were were arriving in naples but not until 1pm. i had continental breakfast in my cabin. had a buffet lunch up on

[mancunian]

Interesting review. I was slightly put off by the thought of the boat drill in several languages. Are there a lot of other notices given out on Costa and are they also in several languages.

 

How did you find the atmosphere. Were there no smoking areas and were they obeyed.

[seabourndt]

thanks for posting glad you like my review.by notices you mean announcements, actually i never got any in my cabin. there is a lot of smokers on the ship, does not worry me though.

[santanesia]

I'm glad that you have overall a good time.

We are going in a X-mas cruise and can't wait!

Thank you for posting yopur review.

Maria

[seabourndt]

glad you liked it,are you goinhg on trhe victoria? she's in brazil all winter i understand. i just love the ship something about her.went on her in 96 to new york. the points system is nice but on the earlier cruise they did not give points for spend on board just the number of days cruising. sha,me as i stioll have not got my next level yet.