Europe - Mediterranean Cruise Reviews

Rhapsody of the Seas by Royal Caribbean was our fist cruise and the bar has been set very high! Every expectation was met or exceeded whilst onboard. Our experience would not have been as pleasant without all the hard working crew members, especially Belando, Leo, and Kadek. These three men worked tirelessly to see that we had a great voyage. They were personable, professional, and always one step ahead of our every "need." My wife and I are interested in making a Royal Caribbean cruise an annual outing now. So, in short, we can't wait for the next cruise!

Hummm.....When I complained about my wife's mattress, it wasn't resolved within the 14 days. Wine list was poor and over priced in my opinion. Too much pushing goods in my opinion and not enough shows, comedy acts, magicians, etc for the 14 nights. Very long waiting times for food to arrive at dinner time. Some tables complained that their food had arrived just plainly warm. Better soundproofing for forward cabins over Palace theater...had to wait noisy bands to finish their shows to be able to sleep. Our Cabin was 6525 so you know what I am talking about. Other cruise lines offer complimentary transportation to and from with NO CHARGE to bus/train stations. Us elderly don't have the mobility like the young ones. Windjammer café closed too early at night....9PM. No midnight buffet anymore....why? Too much greed being placed on pictures....charge less, and more will buy...since it's all digital now.

As a first time cruiser on MSC, with experience on Royal Caribbean and Norwegian, I was looking forward to learning about an Italian-based cruiseline. It was interesting to note that this line allows passengers to come aboard at each of its ports. That means there is a muster just about every day. Our request for extra towels and pillows (a standard request on the other lines) was met with an argument first, then a two-day delay in providing them. Dinner service was stilted, with the servers not understanding rudimentary English. Servers refused to provide plain tap water , insisting that we purchase water instead. Coffee/tea was also not offered - we were told to go to the cafe and purchase it there. At breakfast, service was poor to non-existent. Occasionally, but not always, we were offered juice and bread. Refills on coffee were available, if you could flag down a waitperson and ask for it. Except for breakfast, the food was either tasteless, or comparable to dishwater (soups) or cardboard (sauces). Only two dinners had portions that were acceptable. All the areas of the ship were invaded by unruly, unsupervised children. Despite signs saying that under-sixteens must be supervised by an adult, said adults were not in evidence. I was extremely disturbed to see toddlers in diapers (expressly forbidden in all pools) present, occasionally with parents, in all the pools. The health hazard of this seems not to disturb the management. Children were roughhousing - pulling or pushing each other into the water, running around the perimeters, generally being totally obnoxious. Needless to say, there was NO place on the ship to avoid these encounters. The crew seldom smiled or responded in a friendly manner, unlike my experiences with the other cruiselines. The ship generally docked far from the cruise terminal, then offered 'shuttles' to town or the terminal for 10 - 15 euros.  

 

 

Hoped to have lots of fun.  The 2 small pools were not enough for this large ship.

Celebrity Constellation has too many people on it for the size of swimming pools.

Nice work out room. Buffet dinning was average. Night time seated dinning was     

excellent.  Wrong time of year to visit Venice, TOO HOT & SWEATY ! 

Entertainment was poor or average. Other than that Greek Islands were nice.

Food was great, good variety in both dinning rooms and buffet.

Service in dining rooms and specialty restaurants was in need of improvement.

Entertainment was very good.  Ports very good.  Pool crowded and to small  for the amount of passengers.  Overall great cruise for the price good value.

I would rate cruise a 3.9 on a scale of 5.0.

 

 

Had a wonderful time as first timers, staff were excellent courteous and helpful. The dinning was superb and the shows first class. Very impressed with the Equinox. It sailed extremely smoothly.

La Divina is spectacular.  Our balcony room was also spectacular.  Large.  With a bathtub!  The largest balcony I have ever seen.  We spent a lot of time in the room and on the balcony.

MSC doesn't quite have it together.  Lots of problems with communicating (not because of language) events.  They were hugely interested in selling the land trips, and, when I asked questions, concerning ports, they were frequently wrong.  One elevator never worked the entire trip, and another one was out the last couple of days.  Some of the food was excellent--mostly the beef dishes; most of the seafood was pretty bad.  Mushy shrimp/prawns; fishy smell for most of the seafood; salmon non-recognizable.  Italian dishes were very good.

The Entertainment was ok--nothing special.  Virtually all of the music was taped.  The Michael Jackson performance consisted of a guy that moved fairly well, but, other than that, it was amateurish.  There were several acrobats that were good.  The singers weren't very good, and the set lists were laughable.  The sets simply didn't hold together.  Whatever the theme, they seemed to throw in several songs that just didn't fit.

I liked that we actually docked at every port except one.  I felt really sorry for the passengers that wanted to use the day at Rome's port to see Rome.  The port was a zoo!  Sure they would rather sell a land trip, but there should be some advice/help for those that want to do it on their on.  The most laughable land trip was one from La Spezia that went to both Florence and Venice.  Simply not possible; plus, for the Venice part, they had you catch a train from Florence to Venice and return.  Maybe an hour in Venice???

We chose MSC and La Divina because it fit our schedule and we liked the ports.  We would choose it again under the same circumstances.  However, if we had a choice, we would probably choose another cruise lines.

The ports of call were great! Cost of the cruise was fair, however, the entertainment was lacking -- seems like the "actors" were more interested in their performance then singing the actual songs; Casino staff very un-attentative. Host on the third deck dining room (a heavy-set gentlemen) was quite rude night-after-night. Stateroom and front desk staff were just wonderful and every request (small or large) was met with a friendly sincere smile. Art auctions were a joke. Bingo from Kevin was more about humiliation then allowing guests the "pleasure" of winning. Who in their right mind encourages guests to "boo" other guests? Kevin does! 

As usual the cruise was wonderful.  All of the staff did their best to make a great experience.  Easy to board the boat.  Very fast and efficinet in Barcellona. 

The cruise was wonderful, the food exceptional and the service provided by your staff was better than outstanding.  We were especially overly pleased with the outstanding service provided by our waiter, Pariman and his assistant, Valanki, and Sommeliers Milovan and Marco.

Highly recommend the Celebrity line, the Constellation ship and this cruise. Awesome destinations. Working with Eddie from United Cuises was the BEST experience and his helpful suggestions and expertise ensured a fabulous cruise for all of us in the group. Thank you Eddie! Thank you United Cruises!

Overall the Epic is a great ship.  I have been on a bunch of cruises before, this was my first with Norwegian.  While I did like the freestyle cruising concept, the one disadvantage I experienced was that each time we dined, we had a different server.  On previous cruises, we had one wait staff and they got to know us and that to me was a better experience.  I did hear one couple request a waiter so maybe on future cruises we can do the same.  The food was excellent.  Better than previous cruises.  I'm not sure if this is based on the region we cruised in or the cruise line.  The entertainment was good.  My only complaint is that on previous experiences we had a new act every night and on this cruise it was the same 4 acts over and over again.  Having said that, the quality of entertainment was better.  We had excellent tour guides and the excursions were fantastic.  Tough to beat a European vacation!

The Norwegian Epic had a great looking cabin but some of the space was not very practical.  It looks as if it is newly decorated but some of the details were not passenger friendly such as the lights over the vanity were very dim.  There is a small pull out ledge on which to put your tray if you order room service but there is only one ledge and only one stool for a cabin with two passengers which means one person will have to eat in the bed.  There is also a charge for breakfast room service if you order anything that is not listed in the complimentary menu such as eggs!!   I was also disappointed in that we attended one onboard show which was supposed to be complimentary but we were charged for it on our final bill.  One other disappointment was the adults pool which was very small, maybe a 12 -20 capacity, if that;  the water was also around bath temperture.  But a very pretty ship.

I have sailed many cruise lines over the passed 30 years (in my 50's) with kids and without. This was the best! The entertainment was outstanding. EVERY NIGHT AN EXCITING NEW SHOW WITH NEW PEOPLE FLOWN IN. The magician, Oceans apart and the Other guys along with the specail cruise production staff was amazing. We ate in the "normal" dinning room no specaillty restauarants the food was delicious! Our waiter Willie and Augus we kept the same week. (free stlye cruising) we were trated like royality. The only problem we had was trying to decide what we wanted all great choices. The entertainment staff was non-stop with games, dancers parties I don't think they're himan because i dont know when they sleep. Gio does a great job of keeping us all enteratined. There was several buffett to eat with specail BQ at pool side. (heaven forbid we go 45 min. without eating,) my favorite was in the Raffles buffett for breakfast Amanda and Kelly always came around with fresh pastries and greeted us with a smile "Good morning Chef's surprise!" You had to start the day with a smile after that. The ship is better the hospital clean. The crew works very hard and is so polite and happy. One person was cleaning the stairway banister I asked if I could take her home with me. She said no! loves her job on ship. After a hot day at port yu are met with cold washclothes and a cold drink before going on board. and of course "WASHY WASHY HAPPY HAPPY." You need to take cruise but to laugh as we do now however great way o keep things germ free. Next cruise is Norweign and that with out the awesome ports we went to!        

This cruise was fast paste for senior citizens and too long length in days.  There were too many children (6-12years) running wild and unattended by parents on this cruise.  The food was ok and the drinks cups should be at lest  6 oz..  Sodas shouldn't be included in the drink package.  People should be told of the extra expenses that can or will occur on cruise.  The cleaning or serving crew all seemed to be afraid to speak or communicate with us and were watched constantly by supervisors. This was a very uncomfortable cruise, it looked like modern day slavery at work.                 

The itinerary was a great experience. The room was good. The food was not as good on the spirit as it was on the sun last year. The female waitress in windows dining was not to pleasant. The entertainment was good.

Horrible service, terrible menu, served cold meals in main dining rooms.  Old ship, broken toilet in our cabin, things were duck taped and glued together.  Stay away!

As this was a 40th anniversary and wife's 60th birthday present to ourselves, we had very high hopes and we weren't disappointed.

The cruise ship itself was very nice and pretty much what is expected. The food was a bit better than expected and made dinner something to really look forward to. I had a problem with a bad smell in my cabin and was transferred to another similar cabin before my luggage arrived. I can't thank the woman in charge of customer service enough for how the complaint was handled. The cruise line even offered a meal in one of the upscale restaurants with a bottle of wine as an apology. It wasn't needed but was greatly appreciated.

The key to this trip was the ports of call. I allowed me to check off so many cities on my bucket list and to find those cities that I'd like to return to some day. Barcelona is not to be missed. Toulon was a fun day at the beach, Florence and Rome speak for themselves but the train rides were just as memorable. We got to speak to other travelers from around the world. Naples not so nice but Pompei was on the list, Mykonos rode all day on a scooter for only 20 Euro, what a hoot. Istambul/Constantinople was a dream to see since youth, Ephesus was the surprise of the trip. It is not to be missed. Every bit as good and maybe better than the Roman Forum. Athens, one day was enough but there aren't words to describe standing on the Acropolis. Kotor was great, don't miss the 2 hour sail in/sail out and get off the boat early and climb the mountain wall!! Dobrovinik was all I'd hoped it would be. Took a bathing suit and changed in a rest room then swam along the outside of the wall with the locals. Also got some history on the Serbian conflict that was eye opening. And Venice is very nice to walk around.

Thank you Norweigan for my and my wife's trip of a lifetime.

My family and I sailed on the Allure of the Seas this summer on a seven night cruise from Barcelona. We had a junior suite. The room was wonderful with a huge walk in closet. Overall we were very impressed with Royal Caribbean. They were super-efficient both on the boarding and disembarking process. The ship was beautiful inside and out. While the Allure is enormous they have it divided it into various neighborhoods, such as Boardwalk and Central Park, etc. so it never seemed terribly crowded. There were many attractions such as the flow rider, rock climbing, zip line, etc. While they were a lot of fun, it seemed they were closed a lot of the time. The Broadway shows were wonderful too. We saw Mama Mia several times. Some other observations….

The drink plan seemed very expensive. We brought water and pop with us onboard. We also didn’t like the ship’s restaurants that charged for meals, seemed like a rip off. The European ports of call were spectacular. One of our favorites was Marseille. We took the train from the port to the Notre Dame de La Guard. With so much to see and so little time we signed up with Private Cruise Excursions in Rome and Naples. They picked you up at the ship and took you on a personally guided tour. It was worth the extra expense and seemed like a much better value than those offered by Royal Caribbean.

The cruise was overall very good and the boat was overall very good.  

Pros:  Clean, good food, lots of options for entertainment and eating, friendly staff.

Cons:  If you intend to do Rome on your own, there is a shuttle to a parking lot where you have to get another shuttle to the train station.  Its horrible.  Taxi's won't take you - so just be aware of that.  Cagney's on the boat is not the best steak on the boat.  You would think, since its the steakhouse it would be - but we had better steaks in the main dining room.