Europe - Mediterranean Cruise Reviews

Great crew and service, great ports of call, good food.  All in all a great value.  Ship was clean, Not a bunch of pool games so travels days was nice around the pool with some music.  Crew was good about not letting people save chairs for more than a hour if they where not there.   

I really enjoyed this cruise. Since it is small compared to the other bigger ships out there, I liked it a lot. It gave us a chance to get to know other guests and the crew. I've been on cruises with a lot more people, and the pool is always packed and it feels like your at a hotel, not a cruise. The experience is better with a smaller group of people.  The staff was incredibly nice, the captain was hilarious, and the ports of call were incredible. The only issue I had was the bathroom smelled a bit like humidity or something had gotten in there, but it wasn't overwhelming. Also, at the end, when going over my bill I saw they charged $12 a day per person for gratuities and stuff, which I wish I had known ahead of time. I would do this cruise again in a heartbeat, the staff was incredible, I can't emphasize it enough

While the Norwegian Spirit is an older vessel, it is still well-maintained.  The crew was OUTSTANDING, the food plentiful and adequate.  There was a multitude of activities, and one could keep as busy as desired.  For us it was a wonderful experience and one we would recommend.

Whoever remodeled the NCL Spirit done in 2011 did a sorry job. They did not attend to details which makes the ship look sloppy. The crew is good but the logistics are bad. We still enjoyed ourselves, like they say "no choice" but to get the best out of a bad experience. We have cruised on Carnival, Princess, Royal Caribbean and Celebrity and this ranks the last. We don't know what to say to future Cruisers. Just try the best ones, like Celebrity. Thank you.

Great crew...loved 'Gio' ...our Cruise Director, and all his staff....loved Ryan, our stateroom Steward,,,,couldn't be nicer....just a good person. All crew on this ship were outstanding. Very happy with them. Stateroom kept very clean, same with ship.  We were impressed with and appreciated the commitment to keeping risk of infection low---'washy-washy' crew with hand sanitizer spray at entrances to all restaurants.

Food on the cruise, was, so-so....have had better on Carnaval....balcony stateroom was smaller too, than Carnaval...both comfortable, but cramped. Very little storage space for clothing...basically, the majority of our clothes went on hangers or the small shelves both in the closet.

Two things we were unhappy about...we arrived on Sept 3rd, boarded the ship in Venice...also listed to be in Venice on Thursday, the 4th, but confusing departure time of 0100 also listed for Thursday, when we awoke on the 4th, we were at sea....we had looked forward to walking around Venice on that day, so missed Venice.  The 2nd issue was our shore excursion to 'walk Vesuvius and Pompeii'...program listed a 9am time for start of tour; ticket said, 0830, we arrived at the meeting place at 0845, tour had left!  Very unhappy about that.  So, we missed that one...the crew did offer a replacement excursion, lessor priced, and refund for the missed tour...we were ok with that, but had really looked forward to the climb up Vesuvius as hubby's family had emigrated to the US from San Guiseppe Vesuviano/Ottaviano area which are on the back side of the volcano, and we hoped to see those towns.

I've been on more than 20 cruises and I would rate this as one of all-time worst cruises. The food was absolutely terrible. Luckily we have a sense of humor and our table-mates also had a good sense of humor. We sent our food back almost every night. It became a joke - which food will we send back tonight.

Getting off the ship where we tendered was so disorganized. We only had a few hours in the most beautiful ports in the world and we spent most of the time waiting for our tender number to be called. Costa really needs to improve on getting passengers off the ship in a timely fashion so that people can enjoy and explore the beautiful cities. What a shame that we spent most of our time waiting.

I don't know why we stopped at Bari, Italy. I think spending more time in Mykonos or Santorini would have been much more interesting.

We took a shore excursion in Santorini and I plan to ask for a refund. We tendered in and then took a bus ride to the beach. We spent 2 hours at the beach, with a drink ticket for juice or coffee. No soda, wine, or beer or even food for the price of the excursion. The bus took us back to the town (according to the excursion for shopping) where we waited in line for two hours for the cable car ride to catch the tender back to the ship. Total waste of time. We were the last ones back on the ship. I'm not sure that they would have left without us had we not made the cable car ride in time.

We had a good time with our friends and made the cruise the best experience possible. But it was not because of the ship or Costa's organization - it was friends and family.

I hope Costa listens to feedback from their customers. They have so much to improve on.

It was our second and most likely last cruise with NCL.

We stayed in one of the Heaven Suites in Aft Section on deck #12

Big mistake!!!!

The whole section was vibrating during the sailing, so for the two first two night we could not sleep.

To go to the Haven section up to the front portion of the ship was an unpleasant walk through the deck 15.

I must tell that the ship is build on a cheap, hardware and woodwork are not fit properly.

Entertainment: Only two shows are OK: "Circus and dinner" and "Blue man group", the rest is BS.

Food: Food in main Dining and The Gardens is dreadful,  I strongly suggest to buy a specialty restaurants package.

There are 4,000 people on board, many of them with kids, so be ready: the kids are going to be everywhere, including the restaurant where you are having romantic dinner!!!!

That's what it means - FREE STYLE CRUISING!!!!!)))))

I would recommend this ship and cruise  to anyone who wants a glimpse of Spain, France, and Italy. The LOS is beautiful---very clean, lots to do and has a great promenade. We had a junior suite and woke up to beautiful scenery each day! The Staff was great!!!

I give it 4.5 stars instead of 5 because of the food. The dining room was beautiful and there were other choices of where to eat ....but the "quality" of the food was not what I expected. Not to say that all the food was average.....but much of it was just ok. One complaint I had was that they put mayo on all the sandwiches in the snack areas. We went to the Windjammer, but they did not have the same variety of deli meats. We asked if we could have the sandwiches without mayo and they said they come that way. Also, we went to the dining room for breakfast and they admitted the  eggs were powdered.

I will continue to check out RCI as my first choice for cruising but I think for the price of the  European cruises, there should be more attention paid to the quality and taste of the food. 

Ali S.

We have cruised on 4 different ships, including this one. This ship was the worst of the 4. The food was 

marginal at best, and the help was not the friendliest. Our cabin boy was very nice, and a couple of people on the Lido food area were also nice. The ship was very clean.

i ended up in the emergency room on the ship, and I must say, the nurses and the Dr. Were wonderful. 

Alice Nelson

This journey cannot be put into words.  Listen up everyone!  Take this  CRUISE and you will

never regret that you did.  YOU WILL LOVE LOVE LOVE IT.

Love the Capitan!  He is an amazing man!

Largest ship we have been on.  Lots of people is my only complaint.

I am decidedly not a "cruise person." It is probably my least favorite way to travel in general, but this trip was lovely! The cruise feels much more like a hotel, the common spaces were rarely crowded even on sea days, the food was nice, and the service was excellent. It was easy to get on an off the ship at most of the ports. Overall I am very impressed, and would recommend it highly.

Excellently organized, professional and friendly crew starting with the captain. Super clean..... and the food?:

- unbelievable: variety, quality, freshness, presentation & service.

Ship is clean.  Stateroom was superb as were the attendants.

Quality of food was very good if not totally inspired.  Entertainment was OK, not great but not bad either.

We were in Aqua class.  Excellent but a problem with the Blu dining room on this ship is that they allow the suites and the additional cabins put on the Reflection to eat in the Blu dining room.  This results in waits for your dinner.  We had a some unfortunate incidents in which they forgot about us waiting despite giving us a pager and this was really very poor.  This is a system problem which the cruise company needs to address.  We did not have similar issues with Equinox or Ecclipse, sister ships but which had less Aqua rooms and no Aqua suites and also did not allow the Suites from other classes to eat in the dining room. Unfortunately on Reflection the dining room was not increased in size and this creates the issue on this ship though I have heard they may be adding another dining room as they have clearly realized the issue. 

Since our dining experience is such an important part of the cruise for us, these episodes of dropped appointments, especially since it happened again on our last night, left a bitter taste in our mouth for the whole cruise.   Other than the dining room gaffuffle, the experience in every other regard was satisfactory. 

I would consider this ship and this cruise but I would question whether it is worth the upgrade to pay for the Aqua class, which I had felt in the past it was.  I would not probably go on Aqua class on this ship in the future.

We picked this cruise for the itinerary which was just great. However, the ship was in poor condition with a lot of neglect that had caught up with it. The menu choices in the regular dining areas were boring and the food preparation was very substandard. Some of the meals were almost inedible. The staff was very friendly which was a positive. 

Best cabins that I've ever had.  They were huge!  And this was an absolutely beautiful boat.  It does have the only ballroom afloat, so I would strongly suggest dancing lessons before the cruise.  It was a quiet cruise, and tended to appeal to an older crowd.  This is both good and bad.  Good, since it made for a quiet, relaxing cruise.  Bad, since all activities tended to be geared towards an older crowd.  Dining room food was amazing.  Buffet was average, with mostly British food.  Definitely an upscale cruise for a lower price.

We had a group of 2 couples on this cruise, all over or near 65. We had roomy (by comparision)staterooms with balcony.  Everyday there were many land tours or on board programs. At night, we were at the 6 pm main seating, 8:30 for the theatre show, 9:30 for the Queen's Ballroom and danced until midnight with a live band. During at sea days, we were busy with choosing what and where to eat on the ship, which program to participate and sun bath on the pool side. At the ports that we visited, there were well planned boarding procedure which were systematic,orderly, hassle and worry free,  and many times, the shuttle bus to city centre, or tender (small boats that shuttle between the ship and the pier) were free, and no long waits. The staff were always there to provide help. The passengers' launderettes were very convenient. We loved the Britannia Restaurant which provided very good food and good service. Lido (Buffet casual dining) was excellent.  The food were beyond our expectations. The desserts were different everyday, and everyone was remarkable. I took a Ship's Galley tour that visted the ship's kitchen, and took a photograph with the Executive Chef to show our appreciation. All the written guides to each port were provided with maps and detail information.  In summary: I loved this cruise, and recommend it.  My husband and I have cruised over 8 times with different lines, and by far this is the best.  Entertainment, food, housekeeping, tours, all deserved the top ranking 5 stars. We definitely will go again with Cunard.

Overall it was a good cruise.  Unfortunately, I felt the staff was not all that helpful or welcoming, they did not seem enthusiastic about another cruise and new guest.  The dinning staff made up for the rest, they were exceptional. 

We really enjoyed this cruise. The whole itinerary was beautiful. The cruise ship was in pretty good shape. The rooms were great we stayed at the family suite stateroom and it was great the carpeting could use some replacement and movement within the room was a little difficult as it's tight but other than that everything was wonderful. We would have really liked to have halal options on the cruise ship since there weren't many vegetarian options we got stuck eating a liot of fish thourhgout the cruise trip which got boring after sometime.

The activities were great, we really enjoyed the cirque dream show, although the blue man group wasn't that great.

Rate the boat a 4/5

Food 4/5

Service 4/5

Rooms 5+/5

Good itinerary.  Would recommend taking it out of Rome instead if you can (you can board this cruise in Rome or Barcelona).  The reason is that Rome is a 3-4 hour round trip from the boat and Barcelona is a port city.  If you board in Rome then Barcelona is an excursion without the 3-4 hour trip.  Drinks less expensive than Royal Caribbean and Carnival.  Food was way better than RC and Carnival.  Specialty restaurants excellent.  Recommend Cagney's for Steak and the hibachi restaurant.  Regret we didn't try the Ice Bar.  Heard it was "cool".  We are sworn off of Carnival and will have to think hard about RC after this experience.

Great cruise to italy france and spain.Dinner great. very much ok!  Staff are very nice and work hard at keeping everything clean. I would go again in a heartbeat!