Dipping our toes into cruising...

[Omega1]

Originally Posted by PlutoFan

I would imagine that older ships have larger rooms, as hotels do?

See more...

Not really - in my experience cabins on modern ships tend to be larger.

[MrsBC]

Originally Posted by PlutoFan

However, it is with Marella Cruises - new name for Thomson Cruises. Does anyone have any idea of what they are like?

See more...

We've always avoided them as the ships are older and they are mainly British cruisers. I know we're British cruisers too but we like the American lines better.

[Cloverlady]

Originally Posted by PlutoFan

Soon, after much shilly-shally about we had almost decided on a cruise out of Venice, down the Adriatic and round to Athens and back BUT then we stumbled over one from Malaga up to Porto, down to Lisbon and the Algarve then Gibraltar, Cadiz and back to Malaga which we really liked the sound of.

However, it is with Marella Cruises - new name for Thomson Cruises. Does anyone have any idea of what they are like?

See more...

Well done for taking the plunge!
You'll be hooked - we were - we did our first cruise at Easter this year, loved it so much we now have FOUR other cruises lined up!

As for Thomson, Marella, not cruised with them so far, (we did MSC Cruise Lines round the Caribbean), but we have a Thomson cruise lined up for January.
We are going round the Canaries and we cannot wait!

Having researched, the Thomson cruises do seem to be on smaller/older ships BUT the cruise doesn't have to be a negative experience because of this!
Your itinerary sounds fab , and it will be a lovely intro into the world of cruising I'm sure!
Are you having all inclusive (drinks and tips included)?

Our other 2 cruises are with Royal Carribean (going around Asia) and with Carnival (2 doing Mexico/Caribbean) so we are going through the cruise companies one by one!
As you can tell, we're hooked after one cruise!

[Omega1]

Originally Posted by Cloverlady

... Royal Carribean (going around Asia)

See more...

What is your Asia itinerary? We've done four Asia cruises and absolutely love it.

[Cloverlady]

Originally Posted by Omega1

What is your Asia itinerary? We've done four Asia cruises and absolutely love it.

See more...

Hi Omega
We fly to Singapore, have 3 nights on Orchard Road, then cruise from Singapore on Mariner of the Seas
Calling at Phuket
Cochin
Goa
Oman
and Dubai, where we fly back from.

Exciting, but a bit daunting! We've only cruised once before so far, and never been 'out east!'

What was your itinerary? Glad you loved it!

[Omega1]

Originally Posted by Cloverlady

Hi Omega
We fly to Singapore, have 3 nights on Orchard Road, then cruise from Singapore on Mariner of the Seas
Calling at Phuket
Cochin
Goa
Oman
and Dubai, where we fly back from.

Exciting, but a bit daunting! We've only cruised once before so far, and never been 'out east!'

What was your itinerary? Glad you loved it!

See more...

The Mariner is a nice ship, we did a Caribbean cruise on her in 2009.
We haven't been to India but have done land based holidays as well as a cruise ship stop in Phuket. With a ship the size of Mariner, it's likely you'll tender to the floating jetty at the southern end of Patong Beach. In 2016,we docked at Panwa but we were on a much smaller ship (HAL Volendam). A small group of us from the ship, negotiated with a minibus type taxi driver and did a tour of the southern part of the island - it was ridiculously cheap, something like £10pp.
We visited Oman (Muscat) on a cruise back in 2010 - we walked to the local souk for a look around and then got a taxi to show us the sights for a few hours - again, very cheap. The driver was lovely, spoke good English and very proud of his country. The royal palace is beautiful. We liked Oman and would would like to go back.

[Cloverlady]

Originally Posted by Omega1

The Mariner is a nice ship, we did a Caribbean cruise on her in 2009.
We haven't been to India but have done land based holidays as well as a cruise ship stop in Phuket. With a ship the size of Mariner, it's likely you'll tender to the floating jetty at the southern end of Patong Beach. In 2016,we docked at Panwa but we were on a much smaller ship (HAL Volendam). A small group of us from the ship, negotiated with a minibus type taxi driver and did a tour of the southern part of the island - it was ridiculously cheap, something like £10pp.
We visited Oman (Muscat) on a cruise back in 2010 - we walked to the local souk for a look around and then got a taxi to show us the sights for a few hours - again, very cheap. The driver was lovely, spoke good English and very proud of his country. The royal palace is beautiful. We liked Oman and would would like to go back.

See more...

that all sounds great, loving those prices!

So, do you seasoned cruisers not always stick to the ship's excursions then?
think I'm still too much of a newbie to step out of the safety zone LOL
Not worried about independent trip operators bringing you back late? Or is that a needless worry?

[Gill H]

We did a mix. We only wanted to do half day tours anyway, so no danger of being late.

From Naples, we walked through the cruise port, and in the car park there was a little shuttle bus company that took us to Herculaneum (we had found them on Cruisecritic and read good reviews.) They charged 15 Euros each for a return journey. On the way we shared with some people going to Pompeii, but the lady told us that on the way back, we were the only ones coming back from Herculaneum, so they would send a car instead of a shuttle bus. It took about 20 minutes to drive there and we were told they would pick us up in 2 hours.

It cost 11 Euros each to get into Herculaneum, and then an English tour guide asked if we wanted to join their small group, at a cost of 12.50 Euros each. We had a good hour and a half's guided tour with her.

DCL were charging almost $200 for something similar!

On our return, since we were the only passengers we asked to be dropped back in central Naples rather than the cruise port, and we explored a while before getting a taxi back to the port about 2pm.

For Rome, we stayed on the ship - it's almost a 2 hour journey each way and frankly it would be cheaper for us to do Rome for a few days another time, than to go on a Disney cruise again!

For Pisa we took the DCL tour which got us back in time for lunch.

For Marseille the free shuttle bus at the port dropped us in town, and we had a couple of hours wandering round before going and getting one back.

[Cloverlady]

Originally Posted by Gill H

We did a mix. We only wanted to do half day tours anyway, so no danger of being late.

From Naples, we walked through the cruise port, and in the car park there was a little shuttle bus company that took us to Herculaneum (we had found them on Cruisecritic and read good reviews.) They charged 15 Euros each for a return journey. On the way we shared with some people going to Pompeii, but the lady told us that on the way back, we were the only ones coming back from Herculaneum, so they would send a car instead of a shuttle bus. It took about 20 minutes to drive there and we were told they would pick us up in 2 hours.

It cost 11 Euros each to get into Herculaneum, and then an English tour guide asked if we wanted to join their small group, at a cost of 12.50 Euros each. We had a good hour and a half's guided tour with her.

DCL were charging almost $200 for something similar!

On our return, since we were the only passengers we asked to be dropped back in central Naples rather than the cruise port, and we explored a while before getting a taxi back to the port about 2pm.

For Rome, we stayed on the ship - it's almost a 2 hour journey each way and frankly it would be cheaper for us to do Rome for a few days another time, than to go on a Disney cruise again!

For Pisa we took the DCL tour which got us back in time for lunch.

For Marseille the free shuttle bus at the port dropped us in town, and we had a couple of hours wandering round before going and getting one back.

See more...

Thanks Gill I think I need to be a bit more daring braver!

Especially as, annoyingly, quite a few of the ship's tours (on various of our upcoming cruises) all seem to incorporate a visit to a local business where you can buy the local produce No thanks, been on similar pre-arranged trips on land based holidays and find far too much time is spent at these places than more time spent doing or seeing what you wanted to see in the first place.

[Gill H]

We figured there is a limit to what you can do in a day, and it is more expensive to go on a DCL ship than to any of the places we visited! So more time on the ship was just fine.