Norwegian Jade - 7 day Venice cruise
Norwegian Jade Cruise Review to Europe - Eastern Mediterranean
Greek Isles & Turkey from Venice
Sail date: June 30, 2012
Ship: Norwegian Jade
Cabin type: Inside
Traveled as: Couple
Reviewed: 7 years ago
Review summary
After a four year hiatus, we choose to take the Norwegian Jade cruise from Venice. We chose NCL as we’d cruised once before with them so knew what we’d get and this cruise as it departed from Venice and had an interesting, varied itinerary a little off the ‘beat and track’ such as Split in Croatia and Ephesus in Turkey.
As we’d done before on prior cruise, we’d arrived in Venice a few days beforehand so had created a little mini-break holiday really getting to explore the city and area first. If you can find the time then you won’t be disappointed having at least a whole day in Venice, ideally 2 or 3.
As the Jade is one of NCL’s ‘Jewel class ships, we found our way around easily having been on the Gem last cruise. We did feel that the passengers on this cruise had fewer youngsters and teens than a prior cruise from Barcelona, but that may be just the dates we cruised.
The food and services on board were just as we’d experienced before on the Gem, so we were happy with the quality and overall value that NCL provides. That said, we did have one waiter one evening in the main dining room who was very curt and sloppy. Otherwise, we had great service from all other NCL crew, considering their workload in the dining areas their front of house team really work hard to serve.
The stops at Dubrovnik and Split in Croatia were real eye-openers. In the summer weather, what we saw of these cities and the surrounding Croatian countryside and coast was glorious. They’re very much on our ‘go-back-again’ list.
If you take a tour to Ephesus then you’ll most likely get some hawkers selling sweets and souvenirs as soon as you arrive before entering the archaeological site. Try to resist buying then as you’ll then be burdened with carrying it all the rest of you tour and especially that when you leave the site, you’re at another location where there’s a mini market area with plenty of stalls and more hawkers selling same merchandise for less!
When you disembark in Venice, if you have a late evening flight, then take advantage of a luggage service offered there. For about €15 you can leave your luggage right there, get water bus into central Venice for the day and then head to the airport where they will have already transported your cases to their pick up facility just outside the terminal.
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