Europe - Eastern Mediterranean Cruise Reviews

disappointed that we only received a 100 credit for missing the Croatia port - would have expected a more significant credit as a refund or credit toward another cruise.

Overall a good cruise except due to the ship's technical issue, we missed Dubrovnik (1 of 5 ports). $100 compensation is not fair and equitable.

There was a fire in the engine room, but we weren’t told about it. It only said a mechanical issue. Didn’t stop at Dubrovnik which was why we took this cruise. Very disappointed. We only got $100/ person refund. We don’t care about $100. We wanted to visit Dubrovnik. We found Out about the fire after disembarkation, on the cruise news.

Interesting ports, beautiful room, mediocre food, extra charges constantly.

Pleasant cruise, liked most of the excursions. Food was average with minimum variations. Entertainment was good through out the ship, the theater and at the numerous halls.

Absolutely enjoyed our Azamara Intensive Greece cruise. This was my first cruise with Azamara. I will definitely cruise Azamara again. I highly recommend Azamara. The service was superb!

We just returned from a week on the Norwegian Star on the itinerary that left out of Venice and stopped at Kotor, Corfu, Santorini, Mykonos, Argostoli and Dubrovnik. I choose this itinerary specifically because of the no sea days and the many different ports we were going to visit. A few days before the cruise we did receive an email that we were no longer going to visit Kotor due to the Venice port master only authorizing ships to leave Venice at a certain time. I completely understand this issue however I was frustrated that we weren’t at “least” warned of this ahead of them. Further research into this issue shows that this ship has been canceling Kotor for months and Venice has been having problems. Again, all good information that would have been nice as a disclaimer. The day of embarking I though was incredibly easy. We stayed in the AC hotel Venezia which was access the street from the people mover train . I’m not a huge fan of taking public transportation but this was so easy and literally the first stop is labeled cruise terminal. We were through check in and bag drop off and in our room all within 30 minutes . Having been to multiple Royal Caribbean and Carnival cruises this was my first time on a Norwegian and I was very impressed with the stateroom. More specifically the bathroom. We had an ocean view room but nothing fancy but the bathroom had tons of room as far as cruise ships go! Also, I had a full vanity and as a woman this was amazing although a bit more light wouldn’t have hurt. Now this is a smaller ship and we knew that going in so there wasn’t a whole ton of stuff to do. In terms of the actual boat, we found the following “Pro’s” which were; the very first night performance of the aeriest love duo group, the magician performance, dinner at moderno was excellent and we love gambling so the casino was great for us. We also loved the couples game shows that they did in bliss. Staff was super friendly and nice and great service in most places. I did have several cons however. I typically love buffets, it’s actaully one of my favorite parts about cruising however I thought that the buffet on this ship was pretty bad. Not every day and every meal, but overall It’s like they were “trying” to hard. Also, in general I didn’t find the food as satisfactory as RC was and that was disappointing for me. The sushi as well which I was so excited about was horrible as well as the service. What’s the point of having a rolling belt with no sushi on it? The majority of the shows were not for me either but I guess that’s just a matter of taste. I was also really frustrated that there were several errors on the daily sheet that basically alluded to the fact that things were free like wine tasting but when you get there, they aren’t. I had read on a previous review that NCL has a lot of upcharges and boy they weren’t kidding. You will pay extra for literally everything! It got really annoying and frustrating after a while. Also, Literally half of the activities every day had some type of fee. Also It felt like there was a lot of bait and switch activities. Like for instance come guess the weight of this statue and then be downstairs at a certain time but wait we need to go through an hour long art auction to see if you won first! Annoying In reference to ports, the biggest concerns my research showed was tendering to the dock. Also, as you may have read the port times are VERY short. I empathize very because some of the stops were almost Laughable in time. Since every port is different I’ll describe them each. Corfu: we were docked directly here and we ended up doing the 4x4 tour through the ship which surprisingly was the best tour of the whole shop! You need to be able to drive a manual comfortably to do this and It was a great way to see the whole island in the short amount of time! Santorini: this was the port I read nightmares about so i came prepared. I didn’t want to waste a second as this was the most beautiful place I’ve ever seen. We were tendered this day and knowing that , i had my husband wake up early to get a tender ticket. You don’t have to have one but if you want to get off the ship at a decent hour after docking, you need one. The tendering took about 45 min even though we were group 3, then the cable car to the top which you have to do took another hour. So by the time we got off and met our private tour, it was 2 hours after we began the process of trying to get off the ship. Same situation with going back down, took another hour. This isn’t really NCL’s fault, not much they can do. There are just SO many cruise ships docking and only a couple cable cars. BE prepared. There is no way around the wait. You’ll be lucky if your at the top in less than 1.5 hours. Mykonos: Another tender port but this was different and was incredibly quick. We were off in about 15 minutes. I think due to the late night in Santorini departure and the early Morning here the only people that would have been up early are the people with excursions. Here we had a private snorkeling tour. Argostoli: we were docked here. Easy off in less than 5 minutes. Not a whole ton to do here in port and a short time. Cabs are easily accessible. We did take a cab and visit a small winery called Gentilini which was amazing! Highly Recommend although they are now closed for the season. Dubrovnik: this port frustrated me because they kept changing the times. We arrived at 6:30am and back on board time was noon! What are you supposed to do at a port stop when it’s pitch Black?? Literally Nothing, i would have loved to spend more time here but this felt like ten minutes and with no possibility of booking a tour we liked (we are not game of thrones fans) we just walked around and went wine and beer tasting. The majority of port stops were amazing especially Santorini. The biggest complaint I heard the entire time was how short the port stops were and I don’t disagree. In my opinion they could have cancelled one entirely in an effort to make the other ones longer. We also arrived about an hour early to most Ports. Back on board is 30 minutes before departure. It just got frustrating after awhile having to constantly wake up at 6am, it’s vacation and sometimes we want to sleep in and not wake up at 6am to walk around for an hour. Crowd wise, it’s definitely a different vibe than RC. It felt like Majority were over 50 however I did see some people in the middle age bracket. Virtually no kids (that I saw) as it’s October and kids are mainly in school. The atrium area is very small which is what’s to be expected on a small ship but what bothered me the most was the horrific playing from the band that plays all day and all night. Omg It was horrible and we literally held our ears everytime we had to walk past. Overall we had a great trip however I struggled with a 3 or 4 star rating on this. I think overall I would give It 3.5. There are a lot of things that NCL could control that could make this cruise an easy 5 and of course some things they can’t.

This cruise is still worth a look because of the ability to stop through multiple Greek islands that could be expensive to travel to. It's nice to have almost daily excursion stops. Otherwise, the cruise experience itself is fairly average and not as engaging as some of the entertainment on other routes. The dining is also just OK since it's freestyle based.

Having worked throughout the summer, we knew that we would appreciate an autumn break. Venice is an hour and 30 minutes by airplane from Amsterdam, and we'd never visited Venice before - so this was an ideal couple of weeks away!

enjoyed everything about the cruise. Our second time with royal carribean. Have reccomended it to our friends and will cruise with RC agin

Most cities were beautiful and glad I visited such as Kotor, Mykonos & Santorini, Corfu. Bari was OK not great. Excursions were not worth the money. Service as absolutely terrible. Will never take a MSC cruise again!!

We just thoroughly enjoyed our cruise. We plan on going again!

Your excellent service makes us remain loyal customers of Royal Caribbean Cruise. We've reserved an open book for our next cruise in Europe for 2021. Looking forward to our next adventure! Thank you!

Avoid Norwegian since you will be stressed out every port of call with tender. And it seems our ship did that a lot compared to some other ships which were able to use dock. Maybe Norwegian got a savings for not using dock?

We are heavy cruisers ( 28 to date ). This is the first time the service was not to part. With other cruise lines, the bar attendants will chase you down to purchase drinks by the pool side. With this sailing ( and I'm sure with other MSC ) I would need to go to the bar and wait a minimal of 30 mins to be served with the crowd of people standing in line. There are no smiles from the other employees. They're just there for a pay check.

A wonderful time. Very friendly & helpful staff. We loved Corfu & Croatia. Doesn’t offer much onboard activities.

We had a fun time. The cabing was very noisy and it rattled when the ship cruised at night. The staff did inform us the ship is old and there newer ships do not have this problem The first night we could not sleep it was so noisy in the cabin. The ship is old and tired and many things on the ship are just old and broken. This ship seriously needs a redo. The food was substandard. We struggled with it just because the quality was so bad. While we had a lot of fun each time it came to eating, it seemed to bring up a conversation between my wife and I just how bad the food is. We managed to eat off the ship a lot to avoid eating on the ship.

Overall give the cruise an average rating. Lost water for a couple of hours and couldn't use bathrooms. Never had this happen before and they offered no explanation.

Staff was not properly trained on the ultimate beverage package. Bar staff needs to understand how to acknowledge guests and do their job. Overall, the staff acted like they couldn't care less about their guests

Would like someone to review the issue w/ our carpet in room.