First Seabourn cruise TR where inflatable kiddie pools, Cerberus heatwave &"would you like some sparkling with your apple juice" happened ;)

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

Back to dinner that evening:

For my app I chose the eggplant relish and hummus and my husband did the baby romaine salad



Both my husband and I ordered the sautéed scallops and red wine braised beef confit but without the scallops as we are not seafood people. The beef confit may not look the most appetizing (sorta looks like a meatball) but it was so good, so tender, so flavorful.




For dessert I had the coconut meringue with raspberry sorbet



And my husband had the pistachio souffle. For the souffles, at the table the waiter spoons a hole in it and pours the sauce inside it then places the top part back on top.


And they also brought out petit fours automatically

 

[john7994]

Back to dinner that evening:

For my app I chose the eggplant relish and hummus and my husband did the baby romaine salad
View attachment 781799
View attachment 781800

Both my husband and I ordered the sautéed scallops and red wine braised beef confit but without the scallops as we are not seafood people. The beef confit may not look the most appetizing (sorta looks like a meatball) but it was so good, so tender, so flavorful.

View attachment 781801


For dessert I had the coconut meringue with raspberry sorbet

View attachment 781802

And my husband had the pistachio souffle. For the souffles, at the table the waiter spoons a hole in it and pours the sauce inside it then places the top part back on top.
View attachment 781803

And they also brought out petit fours automatically
View attachment 781804

Looks splendid! The pistachio soufflé looks amazing.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

After dinner we decided to go to The Club at TK Grill which is a bar area connected to the TK Grill. This is open to everyone but is often used to get a pre-drink in before your TK Grill reservation.

At this time they had the piano singer going she was pretty good. I opted for just water and my husband had an Old Cuban..it was interesting not bad but odd?


Once we finished our drinks we went back to the room. Turn down service had been completed and we were met with a gift


It is standard to provide a tote though they have been struggling with supply chain issues disrupting this, some have been a newer blue design (which I like better) and unfortunately sometimes depending on which cruise you’re on and ship they didn’t have them available to give out.

The Herald has only just recently (either late June/early July) been brought back as provided daily printed in the rooms. Before, due to the pandemic, it was either available on the app Seabourn Source (which is heavily used these days) or you could get it from Seabourn Square upon request. It's a long list but suffice to say Seabourn is doing some tweaking here and there with a new president in an attempt to bring back or improve things that have occurred since they resumed cruising.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

Looks splendid! The pistachio soufflé looks amazing.

I totally had to have a taste of it. I agree with my husband a tad rich in that particular version but still very good.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

On the note on the bed was an invitation to a first timers cocktail event where you get to meet some of the crew including the captain the following evening. Skipping ahead that was a neat event, talked to the jeweler who advised he did 6 months contract, went home for about 2 to 3 months depending on the time and then moved to another ship for another 6 months contract. Met the safety officer from Australia where we discussed the weather which was getting progressively hotter and how it was back home for us and then Australia as well as other things. And we met other crew as well. Various nationalities were represented.

Seabourn tends to have a reputation for closeness with the crew and passengers. I witnessed long time cruisers who had close bonds with crew members and not just on a service level where you expect it to be professional but also on a more "ah I've missed you, when will you be back" way.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

That night my husband had also gotten a phone call from a travel agent representative on board, not a Seabourn one but one connected to our TA we had used, inviting us to attend a cocktail at The Retreat just after the first timers welcome event. The Retreat is only on Encore and Ovation and is essential cabanas and a hot tub on the 12th (highest) deck. It is an extra cost (one of the very few things) costing more on sea days than port days.

So the TA explained to us that our TA we used is part of the Distinctive Voyages group which has hundreds of cruises per year. What is unique about this is they include an excursion. The excursion was set for Kotor, Montenegro which was our 2nd stop. The cocktail event was to turn in forms if you wanted to attend and mingle with the people who would be going on the excursion with you. We honestly didn’t know about this until just then so our TA probably dropped the ball a bit on that. The included excursion was extremely close to one we wanted to do just didn’t include the Maritime Museum and Seabourn’s cost was $170/pp so we were like “we’ll just explore Kotor on our own”. Later on I will describe just how happy we were to have been able to do the excursion we did.

Again skipping ahead the cocktail event the following evening while quick enough because it was so hot was great. The group that would be going on the excursion were friendly people and we would run into several of them multiple times either on the ship or other excursions.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

So after all that eventful day we sat out on the balcony, I reading my kindle and my husband listening to music or a podcast, while every now and then looking up at the stars. What a way to end the night! When my husband and I do beach vacations we often love sitting on the balcony at night listening to the ocean (which is usually why close enough to the ocean and ocean view are important to us when selecting a resort and room).

In the room by the way if you look back to the photos there are two sets of curtains. We closed both sets. The one by the balcony doors helps keep it darker when sailing into port in the morning and the second set more by the bed I felt gave us more of a bedroom feel in addition to blocking out more light.

That’s the end of Embarkation Day, following day was Day 1 Vodice, Croatia!

 

[bcwife76]

Enjoying this immensely Saving my spot as I'll want to catch up when we are back from our trip.

 

[GAN]

Back to dinner that evening:

For my app I chose the eggplant relish and hummus and my husband did the baby romaine salad
View attachment 781799
View attachment 781800

Both my husband and I ordered the sautéed scallops and red wine braised beef confit but without the scallops as we are not seafood people. The beef confit may not look the most appetizing (sorta looks like a meatball) but it was so good, so tender, so flavorful.

View attachment 781801


For dessert I had the coconut meringue with raspberry sorbet

View attachment 781802

And my husband had the pistachio souffle. For the souffles, at the table the waiter spoons a hole in it and pours the sauce inside it then places the top part back on top.
View attachment 781803

And they also brought out petit fours automatically
View attachment 781804

Wow ..that’s impressive. You had me at Pistachio!

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

Enjoying this immensely Saving my spot as I'll want to catch up when we are back from our trip.

Hey thanks for joining in! Take your time, enjoy your trip

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

Day 1 Vodice, Croatia
​

The prior night the captain had given the update for the next day’s port arrival, well rather anchoring arrival as Vodice was a tendering port. Original time was about 10am but he advised more likely around 7:30am or so and this turned out to be the case. We woke up at a leisurely enough pace and ate breakfast at the Colonnade. This actually would be the only time we ate breakfast here. Our unplanned excursion the next morning had us needing to realistically do in-room dining and then well we ended up enjoying it so much we just opted to do that for every morning including disembarkation day.

After breakfast we eagerly walked down to deck 4 for tendering. This itinerary had us tendering in 4 out of the 6 ports (this number excludes Athens the end point) so I was understandably so nervous how this would go.

Photo below was taken after we were headed back to the ship at the end of our time in Vodice. Our only complaint would be it could get toasty in there depending on how many people were on it and if there was or wasn’t a breeze.



Other than that one complaint I had zero others. Seabourn seemed to run 2 tenders, one leaving the ship as one dropping people off at the dock, just going back and forth and it went very smoothly. There are no complicated rules to who can tender first or not, no tickets, just go whenever. Our excursion passes were loaded up on the app but we never had to scan them, just told them our room number.

I honestly don’t know what other cruise lines do but Seabourn gives you a wallet-sized thing that holds your key card/identification card and instructions for wifi




When you checked in back in Venice a picture of your face was taken and they used that to match it with the barcode scan when you exited and re-entered the ship (I’m sure this is normal procedure for cruise lines). If something happened where your photo didn’t pop up they’d just ask for your room number, though this didn’t happen to us it did to others.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

On your way in and out they have a table with bottled water for you and you can place your used one off to the side when you come back.

Can someone tell me do other cruise lines do this (assuming that other like levels do) or do they make you pay for bottled water on the ship which you can then use for excursions (or refill your own bottle)? We've been wondering what other lines do in this case.



Okay real talk---these water bottles kinda sucked. Seabourn is trying to be less wasteful (they’ve gone to slightly bigger bottles of shampoo and body wash for example) and have removed single use water bottles. But these…these were just not that good. The cap design meant water could get up in it so when you unscrewed it water often would spill out so you kinda had to hold it away from you at first.

In your room they had 3 bigger sized of these bottles as well and would replace those as you used them. It was very nice to have these provided for you, I can respect what they are trying to do and we absolutely needed them for this trip given the heat we would be experiencing.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

Our first stop was Coric Tower which conveniently had a QR code you could scan that would give you a brief blurb in English about it






If you look towards the middle you can see a coat of arms

Here's a closer look


The path to the main side of the tower are the cobblestones which are really the only place we encountered it in Vodice



This is the back side where they have “newer” stones



You can tell that while they take pride in this tower they also haven’t been above using it for practical uses as in one of the photos they’ve attached utility lines.

Walking around it was neat trying to envision a family living there in olden days, anyone else do this when they encounter old (well what we would consider old) buildings?

 

[john7994]

View attachment 782768
View attachment 782769
View attachment 782770
View attachment 782771
View attachment 782772

gorgeous!

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

gorgeous!

I've found most of the ports really did have beautiful photo ops. I can see how this is an attractive part of cruising

 

[john7994]

Our first stop was Coric Tower which conveniently had a QR code you could scan that would give you a brief blurb in English about it

View attachment 782775
View attachment 782776
View attachment 782777

View attachment 782778
If you look towards the middle you can see a coat of arms

Here's a closer look
View attachment 782779

The path to the main side of the tower are the cobblestones which are really the only place we encountered it in Vodice
View attachment 782780


This is the back side where they have “newer” stones
View attachment 782781


You can tell that while they take pride in this tower they also haven’t been above using it for practical uses as in one of the photos they’ve attached utility lines.

Walking around it was neat trying to envision a family living there in olden days, anyone else do this when they encounter old (well what we would consider old) buildings?

Particularly in Jerusalem and Jaffa - I had the same thought process in terms of what we call a street today versus what it was in more ancient times. Also, like I see in the pictures here, the doorways were "short" and the lack of "window" openings (not just the lack of glass) as compared to more modern structures.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

Particularly in Jerusalem and Jaffa - I had the same thought process in terms of what we call a street today versus what it was in more ancient times. Also, like I see in the pictures here, the doorways were "short" and the lack of "window" openings (not just the lack of glass) as compared to more modern structures.

I'm often thinking about how tall (well rather short) people were in the past. From old time mansions we've seen with the beds to doorways and more. At 5 ft 3 I may not have been considered super short long ago

I bet Jerusalem and Jaffa were amazing. Question, did you feel safe there? We saw multiple cruises that either started or ended in Tel Aviv and well we weren't too comfortable going there. If we had gone to Tel Aviv how could you not want to explore right around there. My best friend went to Jerusalem but it was many years ago when we were pretty young (I think it was even pre-9/11).

 

[GAN]

Our first stop was Coric Tower which conveniently had a QR code you could scan that would give you a brief blurb in English about it

View attachment 782775
View attachment 782776
View attachment 782777

View attachment 782778
If you look towards the middle you can see a coat of arms

Here's a closer look
View attachment 782779

The path to the main side of the tower are the cobblestones which are really the only place we encountered it in Vodice
View attachment 782780


This is the back side where they have “newer” stones
View attachment 782781


You can tell that while they take pride in this tower they also haven’t been above using it for practical uses as in one of the photos they’ve attached utility lines.

Walking around it was neat trying to envision a family living there in olden days, anyone else do this when they encounter old (well what we would consider old) buildings?

Beautifu!

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

After Coric Tower we went to the Parish Church of St. Cross. This also had a QR code to scan.






We did go inside but photography was requested to not be taken.





We walked around the town and went into a few shops I had looked up before going there (didn’t see anything I wanted though)



This was actually one of the only spots in any of the towns we went to that had hand rails. Europe from what we’ve gathered and from what others have said as well has not done much to help those with mobility issues. It’s something I think we should be aware of in the U.S. where we see this as very commonplace due to laws. I don’t say this to talk poorly of Europe but rather if have mobility issues manage expectations. I remember when we were in Venice thinking what do you do there because their mode of transportation is boats and that is hard to get in and out of if you had issues.



One thing Vodice has an abundance of is rosemary plants. Just walking along you couldn’t help but smell it as you passed so many of the plants.

And I loved seeing hopscotch on the ground